V"   »' 
/<!./   ■ 


■■■■■-  •''■'''■*' •'■'^S;;-';4^-'?C#ll 


;  t^\  < 


LIBRARY 

OF  THE 

University  of  California. 

Gl  FT    OF 

^.....^,.s.  \.l/\  :.r-v^-Tn 

Class 

CONCENTRATION: 
The  Road 
To  Success 


By 

HENRY 
HARRISON 
BRO-WN 


PRICE  FIFTY  CENTS 


THE  BALANCE  PUBLISHING  CO. 

PUBLISHERS 

DENVER,  COLO.,  U.  S.  A. 


rvw^ 


/»*■■■  fi'>,;<'|^  _^   /^; 


GHIE  U.  C. 


Accusation  Made   by   Oaj^land, 
Officials   That   College   Phy. 
sicians    Refused    Admission 
to    Henry    Harrison    Brown 


DETAH^ED  COMPLAINT 

SENT  TO  GOVERNOR 


Grand  Army  Veteran  and  Of- 
ficer, Stricken  in  the  Greek 
Theater,  Found  Dead  on  Ar- 
rival Later  at  the  Roosevelt 


^y^^^e.^-^^^--'^^^        4      /;(, 


civ1?^T/r  "'V  K^"^'  Harrison  Brown, 
ciyii  xNar  veteran  and  editor,  stricken 
with  Creart  failure  at  the  G.  A  II  exer" 
f'7«/*^.-''e  Greek  thea.^r.  University  of 
Ca  forma.  Wednesday,  was  refused  ad- 
mlttance  to  the  University  of  California 
Infirmary,  and  died  while  being  taken 
to  another  hospital,  were  filed  today 
with  Governor  William  D.  Stephens, 
j  -fc^dward  Mayhem,  employed  in  the  city 
j  corporation  j^ards.  and  Eddie  Hugres. 
{  chauffeur  of  Chief  of  Police  J.  H.  Nedder- 
man  of  Oakland,  who  took  the  stricken 
man  to  the  university  hospital  after  he 
had  collapsed,  and  when  refused  admit- 
tance there,  according:  to  their  story,  took 
him  to  the  Roosevelt  hospital,  are  the 
accusers. 

Professor  M.  C.  Lynch,  assistant  to 
President  B'enjamin  ]de  Wheeler  of  the 
University  of  California,  asserts  that  he 
has  investigated  and  that  he  is  informed  i 
that  the  man  was  dead  before  his  ar- 
I  rival  at  the  University  infirmary.  This 
j  Mayhem  and  Hughes  denied. 
i  "The  man  was  alive  when  we  reached 
j  the  hospital,"  says  Mayhem.  "He  may 
have  died  before  a  doctor  condescended 
to  look  at  him. 

"We  hurried  the  stricken  man  to  the 
university  hospital,  only  a  short  dis- 
tance from  the  theater  and  the  nearest 
place  where  he  could  have  gotten  relief. 
Here  they  refused  to  admit  the  sick 
man.  Finally,  when  we  said  it  was  urg- 
ent and  begged  aid,  a  doctor  came  out 
and  looked  at  him  in  the  machine,  and 
then  said  to  take  him  somewhere  else. 
We  took  him  to  the  Roosevelt,  a  consid- 
,  I  erable  distance  away.  By  that  time  he 
.   .  was  dead." 

I  j  Hughes  confirms  this  story. 
^  I  Mayhem  accompanied  him.  Mayhem 
J.  !  states  that  the  man  was  breathing  when 
I  they  arrived  at  the  hospital,  and  was 
5,  alive  during  their  debate  with  the  hos- 
l  j  p'.tal  attendants.  He  says  that  death 
^  d*d  not  occur  until  some  time  afterward.! 
I  !  Brown  was  dead  when  the  machine  ar- 
.' lived    at    tlie    Roosevelt   hospital. 

\    full   account   of  the   case,   containing 

.1.     stories    of   both    witnesses,    is    in    the 

..  (Mds  of  the  governor.     In  the  meantime 

I  (.he  president's  office  at   the  university  is 

I  aiso    investigating. 


L 


"NOW"   FOLK  PUBLICATIONS. 

NOW  MAGAZINE  (monthly),  champion  ol 
Affirmation;  the  latest  evolution  of  the  New  Thought 
Philosophy.     $1.00  a  year. 

THREE  CORRESPONDENCE  COURSES  of  Les- 
sons which  should  be  studied  in  every  home,  viz.: 
Suggestion,  25  Lessons ;  Art  of  Living,  25  Lessons ; 
Psychometry,  12  Lessons. 

Books  by  Henry  Harrison  Brown. 

CONCENTRATION  :  THE  ROAD  TO  SUC- 
CESS.    128  pp.     Paper,  50c.;  cloth,  ^1.00. 

HOW  TO  CONTROIv  FATE  THROUGH  SUG- 
GESTION. 60  pp.     Paper,  25c. 

NOT  HYPNOTISM,  BUT  SUGGESTION.  60  pp. 
Paper,  25c. 

MAN'S  GREATEST  DISCOVERY.  60  pp. 
Paper,   25c. 

SEIvF-HEAIvING  THROUGH  SUGGESTION. 
60  pp.     Paper,  25c. 

ORIGIN,  HISTORY  AND  PRINCIPIvES  OF 
THE  NEW  THOUGHT  MOVEMENT.  64 
pp.     Paper,  25c. 

DOIylvARS  WANT  ME  — The  New  Road  to 
OpuIvEnck.     24  pp.     Paper,  10c. 

These  are  seven  epoch-making  books.  They  have  received 
highest  commendation  from  the  greatest  thinkers  of  to-day, 
and  from  the  many  who  have  already  bought  and  studied 
them.  They  are  thought  stimulators,  and  point  the  way  to 
health,  happiness  and  success. 

OTHER  PUBLICATIONS  IN  PREPARATION. 


CONCENTRATION: 

—THE  Road  to  Success. 


A  Lesson  in 
SOUL      CULTURE . 

— BY— 

HENRY  HARRISON  BROWN, 

Editor  of  NOW  and  author  of  "  How  to  Control  Fate  Through  Sugg-estion, 

"Not  Hypnotism  But  Suggestion,"  "Man's  Greatest  Discovery," 

"New  Thought   Primmer,"    "vSelf-Healing  Through 

Suggestion,"  and  "Dollars  Want  Me." 


Syllabled  by  Silence,  let  me  hear 

The  still  small  voice  that  reached  the  prophets' s  ear. 

—  Whittier. 


The  thoughtful  man  needs  no  armor  but  this — concentration. 
*  *  *  *  Concentration  is  the  secret  of  strength  in  politics,  in 
war,  and  in  all  management  of  human  affairs, — Emerson. 

The  deeper  the  mind  penetrates,  the  clearer  it  becomes; 
the  more  it  spreads  itself  out  on  the  surface,  the  more  it  is 
confused.  *  *  *  ♦  Read  less,  think  more  of  what  you  have 
read.  Act  toward  a  difficult  task  as  a  brave  general  who  leaves 
his  foe  no  rest  till  he  has  overthrown  him. — Confucius. 

Price,  paper,  50c;  cloth  bound,  $1.00. 


THE  BALANCE  PUBLISHING  CO., 

Denver,  Colorado,  U.  S.  A. 

1907. 


LONDON  : 

L.  N.  Fowler  &  Co., 
7,  Imperial  Arcade,  Ludgate  Circus,  E.  C. 


Copyrighted,   1907, 
by    "NOW"     FOIvK. 

Entered  at  Stationer's  Hall, 
Ivondon,  Eng. 


CONTENTS. 

Introductory :— What   is   Success? 

Section.  Page. 

I.     The  "Why"  of  the  Book 10 

II.     Concentration  a  Natural  Process 14 

III.  Paying  Attention    20 

IV.  Some  Channels  of  Waste   26 

V.     "I  Am  Life"   32 

VI .     How  Shall  I  Concentrate    36 

VII.     The  Will   39 

VIII.     Habits    43 

IX.     "In  the  Silence"  48 

X.     Compensation  of  Concentration 54 

XL     With  Eyes  See  Not 61 

XII.     The   Ideal    66 

XIII.  Prayer    74 

XIV.  Desire  versus  Wish   79 

XV.     Mental  Poise 85 

XVL     Methods  of  Concentration   87 

XVII.     Directions  for  Practice 92 

XVIII.     How  To  Do  It   97 

XIX.     Some  Practical  Suggestions    100 

XX.     Self-Study  and  the  Law  of  Life 105 

XXL     Special  Desires  versus  Principles 109 

XXII.     My  One  Rule  :— Agreement   114 

XXIII.  Love    118 

XXIV.  Opinions  and  Methods  of  Others 122 

A  Parting  Word 126 


Jfi0602 


To 
Those  who  durijig  four  years  of  Association 
Have  fnade  every  day  simshiny  through  the  Affi.r7natio?i. 
HE  A  VEN  IS  MINE,  NOW  AND  HERE! 


INTRODUCTION 


WHAT  IS  SUCCESS? 

The  force  of  that  mysterious,  but  irresistible  power — Hu- 
manity's common  and  concentrated  Thought. 

— Senator  Beveridge. 

In  what  does  success  consist?  Many  persons  desire 
to  know  how  to  be  successful.  How  to  win  success. 
Before  this  question  can  be  answered  there  must  be  an 
understanding  as  to  what  they  mean  by  success,  and 
what  success  stands  for  in  this  Book.  I  asked  a  corre- 
spondent what  he  meant  by  success,  and  his  answer 
was,  "I  am  in  business,  and  I  wish  to  make  money  from 
it  \"  Another  wishes  to  win  an  office.  Another  to  out- 
strip a  rival.  Another  to  succeed  in  her  book.  And 
here  are  two  young  ladies  writing  me,  one  wants  to  pass 
an  examination  in  school  and  the  other  to  learn  to  ride 
a  bike.  This  is  called  success.  But  it  is  success  without 
Principle.  Success  that  leaves  Life  out  of  count.  It 
is  the  success  of  some  undertaking.  This  is  not  success. 
One  may  succeed  in  any  and  all  these  and  similar  un- 
dertakings and  yet  be  a  failure. 

Success  must  be  measured  by  a  larger  standard.  Can 
we  call  these  U.  S.  Senators  under  indictment  for  break- 
ing the  laws;  these  men  of  whom  Graham  Phillips  is 
telling  in  his  "Treason  in  the  Senate  f  can  we  call  these 
millionaires  who   are  under  the  indictment  of  public 


8  CONCENTRATION: 

opinion,  and  these  society  women  who  are  passing 
through  operations  from  their  doctors,  Successes?  Can 
we  call  the  student  broken  in  health,  though  he  wins 
the  valedictory,  a  success?  Success  in  things  may 
mean  failure  in  Life. 

^^How  may  I  succeed  in  Life  ?"  is  the  only  question  that 
any  conscientious  metaphysician  can  answer.  He  will 
not  answer  the  questions  as  to  success  in  any  enterprise. 
Those  who  attempt  this  are  not  metaphysicians  but  char- 
latans. The  Greatest  of  Metaphysicians  gave  us  the 
rule  for  SUCCESS,  any  other  is  a  mere  temporary 
advice  or  makeshift.  Here  is  the  only  possible 
v^^ay  to  SUCCESS,  that  is  vv^ritten  with  capitals 
— "Seek  ye  first  the  kingdom  of  God  and  His 
righteousness  and  all  these  things  shall  be  added  unto 
you."  A  simple  and  scientific  Law.  It  simply  means. — 
Live  by  Principle  and  not  by  detail!  It  is  as  if  the 
professor  of  electricity  when  asked,  "How  shall  I  make 
a  battery?"  should  answer,  "First  study  up  on  electricity 
till  you  learn  its  principle  of  action,  then  you  wdll  know 
how  to  make  any  apparatus." 

Let  us  analyze  this  law  as  laid  down  by  Jesus.  First 
where  am  I  to  seek  for  the  Kingdom?  Answer,  "The 
kingdom  of  God  is  within  3^ou !"  What  does  kingdom 
mean.  Kingdom  stands  for  Power.  Here  then  is  the 
Law,  Seek  the  Power  that  is  within  your  SELF,  then 
you  will  add  to  yourself  things  you  desire. 
Success  thus  lies  in  the  consciousness  of  Power  to  do 
whatever  I  wish  to  do.  Success  lies  in  the  consciousness 
that  one  can  meet  any  situation  with  satisfaction  to 
himself.  The  manifestations  of  success  are  Health, 
Happiness  and  Supply. 


—THE  ROAD  TO  SUCCESS.  9 

He  is  a  failure  who  finds  that  his  body  will  not  allow 
him  to  do  what  he  wishes  to  do.  He  is  a  failure  who 
mnst  depend  upon  another  to  do  that  which  is  necessary 
to  be  done  for  the  accomplishment  of  his  plans.  A 
successful  man^  though  he  may  employ  a  thousand  men, 
will  feel  that  were  it  necessary  he  could  carry  out 
his  purpose  alone.  The  leaner  is  a  failure.  The  success- 
ful man  is  filled  with  joy.  The  "kingdom  of  G-od"  is 
"the  kingdom  of  heaven/'  and  heaven  is  happiness. 
Therefore  any  condition  in  Hfe  which  does  not  bring 
happiness  is  failure,  and  happiness  is  the  subjective 
cause  of  health.  There  can  be  neither  health  nor 
happiness  till  wants  are  supplied;  therefore  poverty  is 
failure.  I  care  not  hov^  honest,  generous  or  noble  a 
person  is,  if  he  wants  any  of  the  necessities  of  life, 
he  is  a  failure.  For  the  Power  of  God  in  the  Soul 
when  once  found  will  see  that  Supply  ever  is  at  hand. 
He  who  has  found  this  Power  will  find  the  ability  to 
draw  to  himself  Supply.  But  Supply  does  not  mean 
anything  to  hoard  or  to  lay  by  for  a  rainy  day. 

Therefore  in  Soul  Culture  the  definition  of  Success  is : — 
The  consciousness  of  ability  to  meet  every  occasion  in 
life  and  convert  it  into  Health,  Happiness  and  Supply. 
The  way  to  this  consciousness  is  first : — Believe  it;  then 
affirm  it  till  you  become  it.  This  is  the  Affirmation  of 
Success :  I  AM  POWEK  TO  BE  AND  TO  DO  THAT 
WHICH  I  WILL  TO  BE  AND  TO  DO. 


10  CONCENTRATION: 


SECTION   I. 


THE  "WHY"  OF  THE  BOOK. 

Present  power  requires  concentration  on  the  moment  and 
the  thing  to  be  done. 

— Emerson. 

I  swear  I  see  what  is  better  than  to  tell  the  best, 
It  is  always  to  leave  the  best  untold. 

— Walt  Whitman. 

"Another  book  upon  this  subject?"  the  reader  may  ex- 
claim. Yes;  because  concentration  is  the  secret  of 
human  power  in  action.  Waste  is  prevalent  everywhere 
and  the  consequences  are  poverty;,  illness,  unhappiness, 
and  failure.  It  is  a  libel  on  nature  to  think  that  any 
person  should  be  in  any  kind  of  want  because  there  is 
not  supply  and  ability  in  him  to  appropriate  it.  The 
unconscious  perception  of  this  fact  has  pushed  man 
onward  to  present  civilization.  A  more  or  less  clear 
perception  of  the  Law  and  the  Way  has  given  rise  to 
many  schools  of  Human  Culture.  Each  generation  has 
had  its  seers  who  have  studied  the  operation  of  the 
Power  wdthin  man  and  discovered  the  Law,  so  simple, 
that  all  may  intellectually  grasp  it.  But  because  the 
ordinary  person  goes  no  further  than  to  have  a  mere 
general  perception  of  Truth,  this  book  is  added  to  the 
great  metaphysical  stock  and  others  will  necessarily 
come  after  mine.  I  am  but  one  among  the  million.  This 
book  is  but  one  stone  cast  on  the  cairn  that  authors  are 
buildiug  to  the  worship  of  the  God  of  Success. 


—THE  ROAD  TO  SUCCESS.  11 

Concentration  is  not  something  to  be  learned  as  one 
learns  mathematics.  It  is  a  mental  habit  which  is  to 
be  acquired  just  as  the  habit  of  solving  problems  in 
geometry  is  to  be  acquired  by  practice.  Concentration 
is  that  mental  attitude  attained  by  practice,  that  char- 
acterizes the  book-keeper  and  the  mechanic,  who  know 
not  that  others  are  about,  and  who  do  their  work  almost 
automatically  and  unconsciously. 

Concentration  is  that  mental  state,  acquired  only  by 
practice,  which  enables  the  actor  to  forget  self  in  the 
part  he  is  playing,  or  the  author  to  forget  self  in  the 
thought  he  is  writing.  Only  practice  and  more  practice, 
can  produce  it.  For  this  reason  text-book  after  text- 
book will  be  needed,  and  the  thought  must  be  reiterated, 
"line  upon  line,^^  and  enforced  example  by  example, 
till  the  habit  of  concentration  is  formed. 
Because  of  this  I  feel  it  a  duty  to  give  my  testimony  and 
to  help  those  still  struggling  as  once  was  I. 
But  I  have  another  reason.  My  magazine  and  books 
have  caused  a  large  clientele  to  look  to  me  for  assistance 
along  the  lines  of  soul  unfoldment;  they  turn  to  me 
with  questions,  and  I  must  answer.  From  this  feeling 
and  this  need,  this  book  is  born.  It  has  not  been  of 
predetermined  growth.  It  arises  from  my  articles  in 
magazine,  from  my  lessons  in  class,  from  letters  and 
conversations.  Because  I  feel  these  persons  have  made 
inquiries  that  others  are  asking;  these  others  will  find 
what  so  many  have  already  found  in  my  thought;  so 
I  let  the  matter  stand  just  as  first  given,  knowing  that 
the  sometime  repetition  of  the  same  thought  in  a  little 
different  way,  will  through  suggestion  strengthen  the 
idea.    I  simply  talk  to  you,  my  reader,  just  as  I  should 


12  CONCENTRATION: 

in  "^vriting  you  a  letter,  or  in  answering  your  questions, 
were  you  in  my  room.  In  fact  much  of  the  thought 
of  the  book  comes  from  my  class  conversation.  I  trust 
you  will  feel  the  inspiration  from  which  the  instruction 
sprung. 

I  wish  most  in  these  first  pages  to  emphasize  the  fact 
that  it  is  a  mental  habit  you  are  to  cultivate.  I  am 
not  giving  you  a  treatise  for  merely  intellectual  compre- 
hension. It  is  a  book  of  conduct,  rather. 
Any  book  can  help  you  only  in  so  far  as  you  put 
what  you  are  told  into  practice.  As  soon  as  you  grasp 
an  idea,  lay  down  the  book  and  think  upon  it  and 
begin,  then  and  there,  to  practice  what  you  have  learned. 
Repeat  it  over  and  over  as  an  Affirmation.  Tell  your- 
self that  you  live  that.  Practice  this  till  you  uncon- 
sciously, through  habit,  think  in  that  line.  It  will 
ultimately  become  a  habit  for  you  thus  to  think  and 
you  will  live  from  that  Affirmation.  This  alone  is  Con- 
centration. 

When  I  w^as  a  boy  I  was  an  omnivorous  reader;  read 
every  book  no  matter  of  what  kind  I  could  obtain,  from 
Sunday  School,  library,  or  neighbor.  I  thus  created  a 
habit  of  reading  anywhere  and  of  paying  no  attention 
to  whatever  was  about  me.  Often  has  mother  shaken 
me  with  the  words,  "Henry,  where  is  that  armful  of 
wood  you  promised  to  get  me  T^  Or,  "Henry,  when  will 
you  get  that  pail  of  water  ?"  "Why  mother,"  I  would 
reply,  "I  never  heard  you  call  me!"  *'My  son,"  she 
would  say,  "I  have  spoken  several  times,  and  you  have 
answered  me,  'yes.  Mother,  right  away !'  and  now 
I  can  wait  no  longer."     But  I  had  not  heard  her.     So 


—THE  ROAD  TO  SUCCESS.  13 

at  least  I  thought  then.  Now  I  know  that  my  hearing 
was  then  perfect,  but  that  I  paid  no  attention  to  what 
I  heard.  I  did  not  let  the  sound  then  cause  me  to 
think.  I  was  deaf  because  I  did  not  use  m}^  power  to 
convert  sound  to  thought.  The  old  saying  is  true; 
"Deaf  people  hear  when  they  wish  to !" 

How  many  of  my  readers  have  this  habit  of  abstraction 
or  of  absent  mindedness?  And  yet  they  are  the  very 
ones  who  tell  me  they  "cannot  concentrate.'^  Please 
change  this  expression  to  this  form,  and  it  is  true :  "I 
do  not  concentrate  upon  that  which  I  desire !  I  let 
myself  drift  through  habit !"  Study  this  last  sentence 
till  you  get  the  meaning.  It  will  help  to  develop  the 
power  of  conscious  concentration. 

All  I  am  trying  to  do  in  these  conversations  is,  to  bring 
you  to  consciously  do  that  which  you  are  doing  uncon- 
sciously and  automatically  every  day.  I  wish  you  to 
rise  from  hal)it  formed  through  neglect  or  necessity,  to 
a  habit  formed  because  you  desire  and  clioose  it.  In 
the  first  place  you  are  a  slave  of,  and  in  the  last  place 
you  are  the  Master  of,  habit. 


Note — Since  Concentration  is  only  paying  attention  to 
right  thoughts,  I  have  prefaced  each  section  with  extracts 
from  best  literature,  and  recommend  that  the  reader 
memorize  them,  as  they  are  Power-thoughts  and  will,  when 
meditated  upon,  lead  to  Success. 


14  CONCENTRATION: 


SECTION  II. 

COI^CENTEATION  IS  NATURAL. 

If  the  first  rule  is  to  obey  your  native  bias,  to  accept  the 
work  for  which  you  were  inwardly  formed, — the  second 
rule  is  concentration,  which  doubles   its  force. 

— Emerson  in   ''Greatness." 

The  power  of  concentration  is  one  of  the  most  valuable 
of  intellectual  attainments. 

— Horace  Mann. 

Judging  from  letters  and  questions  of  pupils,  no  part 
of  the  Mental  Science  causes  so  much  difficulty  as  the 
demand  that  there  be  Concentration.  I  propose  to  take 
from  this  demand  all  that  is  difficult,  and  remove  all 
obstructions  from  the  mind  so  that  there  will  be  a  clear 
understanding  of  what  is  meant  by  "Concentration/' 
and  what  by  the  phrase  so  much  in  use, — "In  the 
Silence  r 

There  is  no  break  in  the  methods  of  nature.  Ttuth  is 
identical  whether  uttered  by  ancient  or  modern  teacher, 
by  eastern  priest  or  modern  Mental  Scientist.  He  who 
finds  Truth,  finds  it  by  Nature's  one  method.  There 
are  no  patent  rights  upon  any  of  her  secrets,  and  no 
corners  upon  any  method  of  arriving  at  the  perception 
of  Truth. 

The  cave  man  found  it  just  as  MoScs  did,  and  Moses  just 
as  Socrates,  and  Socrates  as  Jesus,  and  A.  J.  Davis  as 
Jesus,  and  Mrs.  Eddy  as  Davis,  and  Henry  Harrison 
Brown  as  they  did.     Therefore,  unless  we  are  to  admit 


—THE  ROAD  TO  SUCCESS.  15 

the  claim  of  special  revelation  and  arbitrary  selection  on 
the  part  of  a  Creator,  we  are  to  analyse  our  own  mental 
action,  and  from  the  way  we  have  come  to  Truth,  realize 
that  all  in  like  manner  come.  From  the  study  of  our 
own  unfoldment,  we  are  to  deduce  ways  for  still  more 
extended  progress,  just  as  we  have  by  study  of  nature's 
methods  in  other  lines  of  manifestation,  learned  to  assist 
her  in  her  unf  oldment. 

As  man,  by  interrogating  nature  has  learned  to  become 
a  factor  in  the  evolution  of  the  material  world,  as  he 
has,  by  the  same  process  learned  to  be  a  factor  in  his 
own  evolution,  mentally,  artistically,  esthetically ;  so 
by  the  study  of  our  mental  conditions  we  are  to  learn 
to  be  a  conscious  factor  in  the  evolution  of  a  control 
over  ourselves. 

The  child  and  the  savant  learn  by  the  same  means. 
The  slave  and  the  king  develop  by  the  same  process. 
The  workman  and  the  poet  win  success  by  obedience 
to  the  same  law.  The  victor  and  the  vanquished  are 
results  of  the  one  instrument.  Nature  is  no  respecter 
of  persons.  All  the  old  conception  of  any  special  revel- 
ation; of  any  peculiar  method;  of  any  newly  invented 
process;  of  any  specially  prepared  series  of  directions; 
of  any  collections  of  teachings,  or  of  any  prepared  form- 
ulas, being  of  value,  must  pass  away.  You  are  to  realize 
that  in  you  abides  the  same  power;  in  you  lies  latent, 
the  same  intelligence ;  in  you  awaits  the  same  germ,  that 
all  other  men  possess,  to  be  brought  into  unfoldment 
by  the  same  methods.  You  are  to  declare, — "What 
man  has  done  I  can  do !  When  I  know  how  others 
achieve  I  also  can  achieve.     When  I  have  learned  the 


16  CONCENTRATION: 

Law,  I  can  use  it!  When  I  find  the  Way  I  can  walk 
in  it.  When  I  see  the  Light  I  can  follow  it.  When  I 
know  the  Truth  I  can  demonstrate  it." 

So  long  have  the  old  ideals  held  sway  that  it  is  important 
that  you  see  that  all  of  the  old  growths  of  error,  of 
self  depreciation,  of  beliefs  in  the  supernatural  and 
in  the  special  are  rooted  out  of  your  mind.  Too  many 
are  trying  to  come  into  the  New  Thought  and  hold  on 
to  the  old  thought  at  the  same  time.  For  such,  Jesus 
spoke,  when  he  admonished  us  not  to  put  new  wine  in 
old  bottles.  New  perceptions  of  truth  will  not  fit  old 
statements,  and  new  perceptions  must  not  be  limited 
to  old  methods.  Truth  is  never  old  and  her  methods 
of  revelation,  the  processes  of  awakening  to  the  per- 
ception of  Truth,  are  ever  the  same.  Do  not  confound 
human  perception  of  Truth  with  Truth  itself,  nor  fix 
it  at  the  ancient  limitation. 
Lowell  tells  us  that : — 

God  sends  his  teachers  unto  every  age, 
To  every  clime,  and  every  race  of  men, 
With  revelations  fitted  to  their  growth 
And  shape  of  mind,  nor  gives  realm  of  Truth 
Into  the  selfish  rule  of  one  sole  race. 

Do  not  make  one  and  the  same,  the  thing  and  the  maker, 
the  seer  and  the  perception.  The  methods  of  seership 
are  always  the  same;  the  methods  of  applying  the  trath 
perceived  to  the  objective  life  are  as  various  as  are 
organizations  and  the  lives  of  the  seers.  No  one  can 
either  perceive  Ttuth  or  live  it  for  you ;  therefore  while 
you  perceive  Truth  by  the  absolute  law  of  Mind,  you 
will  apply  Truth  by  the  special  law  of  your  own  individ- 
uality. Thus  Truth  common  to  all  ages  and  all  men 
is  so  differently  stated,  and  so  differently  applied  that 


—THE  ROAD  TO  SUCCESS.  17 

there  are  thousands  of  sects  and  schools.  But  under 
all  these,  lies  the  one  Substance  named  God,  Brahm, 
Allah,  Joss,  Force,  Mind,  Energy,  Christ,  Spirit,  &c., 
&c.  And  no  matter  what  the  rite,  form,  ceremon}^, 
formula,  method,  law,  rule,  or  regulation  proposed  or 
imposed,  all  these  have  their  base  in  the  same  natural 
phenomena.  Therefore  no  matter  what  claim  is  made 
for  any  system  you  are  to  understand  that  no  sv^tem 
ever  was,  or  ever  can  be,  made  that  will  embody  all 
possible  methods  of  attaining  any  desired  unfoldment. 
No  system  can  be  made  that  will  exhaust  the  possibil- 
ities of  infinite  Principle.  Systems,  forms,  and  rules 
arise  in  the  observance  of  details.  When  you  rise  to 
Principles  you  will  make  your  own  rules  or  have  none. 
Reliance  upon  Principle  and  reliance  upon  rule,  make 
the  difference  between  a  master  and  a  slave;  between 
a  leaner  and  one  self-controlled.  To  rest  upon  forms, 
formulas,  rites  and  rules  is  the  custom  of  church,  state 
and  public  opinion.  To  rest  upon  Principle  is  the  dem- 
onstration of — Individuality. 

A  clear  conception  of  this  point  is  necessary  because  so 
many  teachers,  leaders  and  founders,  are  springing  up, 
claiming  to  speak  with  authority,  or  to  have  devised,  or 
found,  some  plan  by  which  one  may  attain  unfoldment, 
success,  health,  or  happiness  by  some  new  and  original 
road.  Know  this :  all  such  claims  are  based  upon  some 
merely  individual  perceptions  of  the  one  and  the  same 
law  which  every  person  has  obeyed  who  ever  attained 
success.  There  is  but  one  way,  because  Life,  Truth, 
Principle,  and  Law  are  unchangeable. 
The  Spirit  of  Truth  through  Jesus  said — "1  am  the 
way!"     So  It  says  through  every  Human   Soul.     "I 


18  CONCENTRATION: 

am  the  way  V  says  Life.  "I  am  the  way !"  said  Nature 
to  the  scientist,  and  seeking  out  her  way,  it  is  now  his 
way.  In  New  Thought  we  only  interrogate  Nature; 
seek  her  way !  When  we  find  her  way  we  shall  have 
the  only  way.  And  since  all  Truth  is  simple;  since 
every  discovery  man  has  made  of  Nature's  way  is  simple ; 
we  are  to  infer  that  when  we  find  the  way  to  health, 
success  and  happiness  it  will  be  so  simple  that  we  shall 
be  surprised  that  we  did  not  always  know  it. 

I  admonish  you  at  the  beginning  of  any  study,  to  put 
aside  all  systems  that  have  anything  strange,  difficult, 
mysterious,  occult,  or  supernatural;  anything  hard  to 
understand,  or  peculiar  to  do.  They  are  not  Nature's 
way  and  vv^ill  never  be  yours.  Mistrust  everything  you 
find  difficult  to  understand.  Only  so  far  as  any  system 
conforms  to  your  own  simple  life,  does  it  have  any 
value  to  you.  When  you  are  inclined  to  take  up  any 
method  of  self-culture,  ask,  "Is  this  Nature's  simple 
way  ?  Have  all  men  in  all  ages  found  success  through 
obedience  to  this  Principle?    If  so,  I  will  adopt  it." 

Again,  I  advise  you  to  refuse  to  deal  with  any  teacher, 
or  system,  that  proposes  to  do  all  for  you;  to  make  it 
easy  for  you.  There  are  no  easy,  no  royal  roads. 
Though  the  New  Jerusalem  "lieth  four  square  with 
gates  on  each  side ;"  there  are  no  chariots  on  either  side 
to  carry  you  in.  You  must  get  in  by  your  own  unaided 
efforts. 

"Where  did  you  come  from,  Topsy?"  "I  growed!" 
Each  person  must  grow  into  any  condition  he  desires. 
Teachers  may  do  what  the  gardener  does — make  condi- 
tions for  growth.     This  book  and  any  good  book  or 


—THE  ROAD  TO  SUCCESS.  19 

teacher,  can  make  conditions  for  you  to  grow,  by  teach- 
ing you  how  mankind  has  ever  grown. 

I  would  that  you  bring  very  closely  to  yourself  this 
thought — "All  men  are  created  equal  V'  In  this  con- 
sciousness concentrate  your  forces  in  the  thought. — 
"What  man  has  done,  I  can  do !  What  men  know,  I 
can  know.  When  I  know  what  they  know,  I  can  do  as 
they  do!'^  This  is  the  only  possible  rational,  self-re- 
specting mental  attitude.  It  is  the  only  one  under 
which  I  wish  to  claim  you  as  a  pupil  or  as  friend.  In 
this  mental  attitude  we  shall  win.  In  any  other  we  shall 
fail. 

In  other  words  I  have  been  during  all  this  lesson,  ad- 
vising- you  to  concentrate  upon  FAITH  IN  YOUR- 
SELF. This  is  the  keynote  to  the  Arch  of  Character 
and  its  presence  or  absence  constitutes  success  or  failure. 


The  key  to  success  in  the  line  of  all  mental  and  spiritual 
achievement,  is  CONTROL  OF  THE  ATTENTION.  The 
ability  to  concentrate  and  hold  the  attention  upon  any 
given  point  at  will,  and  resist  all  diverting  tendencies  and 
desires,  is  an  absolute  necessity  to  high  attainment  and 
rapid  progress.  Happily  this  is  an  art  that  all  may  acquire 
by  resolution  and  persevering  effort.  The  very  practice 
itself  is  a  wholesome  and  efficient  mental  discipline. 
— Dr.  J.  H.  Dewey  in  ''The  Way,  the  Truth  and  the  Life.'" 


20  CONCENTRATION: 


SECTION  III. 

PAYING  ATTENTION. 

Careful   attention   to   one  thing  often   proves   superior  to 
genius  and  art. 

— Cicero. 
Let  us  labor  for  an  inward  stillness, 
An   inward   stillness   and   an   inward   healing. 

— Longfellow. 
Not  in  the  clamor  of  the  crowded  street. 
Not  in  the  shouts  and  plaudits  of  the  throng, 
But  in  ourselves,  are  triumphs  and  defeat. 

— Longfellow. 

In  the  Study  of  metaphysics,  the  awful  bugbear  of  'The 
Silence"  has  been  let  loose  upon  yon.  As  yon  have  been 
thinking  of  what  I  have  written  and  paid  no  attention 
to  anything  else,  you  have  been  "In  the  Silence !"  As 
you  have  "paid  attention"  to  the  thought  of  these  pages, 
you  have  been  "concentrating,"  and  the  difficult  task 
you  have  feared  is  accomplished;  the  condition  you 
thought  so  hard  to  reach,  is  gained..  How?  By  not 
thinking  of  it !  By  forgetting  you  have  done  ihat  which 
you  wished  to  do.  Never  yet  did  a  person  concentrate 
while  thinking,  "I  am  going  to  concentrate  T  or,  "I 
wish  I  could  concentrate!"  or,  "0,  how  hard  it  is  to 
concentrate !"  As  long  as  you  think  of  what  you  wish 
to  do,  you  will  never  do  it.  As  soon  as  you  forget  your 
wish  to  do,  in  the  doing,  the  thing  is  done.  It  is  this 
continual  thought  of  concentration,  that  troubles  so 
many  of  my  students,  readers,  and  correspondents. 
"I  have  been  a  New  Thought  student  for  years  and 
cannot  concentrate,"  is  a  frequent  expression.  But  there 


—THE  ROAD  TO  SUCCESS.  21 

is,  nevertheless,  in  the  expression,  the  concentration 
sought.  It  shows  Ihat  the  person  has  concentrated, 
not  upon  the  thought  desired,  but  upon  the  wish  to 
concentrate.  This  is  concentration. 
I  have  said  that  we  must  win  by  that  method  by  which 
mankind  has  ever  won :  That  there  is  but  one  method. 
Study  the  life  of  any  successful  person  in  any  age  and 
along  any  chosen  line;  seek  one  among  your  friends 
or  acquaintances;  what  is  the  dominant  mental  quality 
that  gave  him  success?  Be  he  gambler  or  poet,  find 
the  trait  which  gave  him  power.  Find  among  your 
friends  those  who  have  failed  and  see  what  thought 
caused  their  failure. 

Lady  Macbeth  said  to  her  husband: 

But  screw  your  courage  to  the  sticking  place  and  we  shall 

not  fail! 

We  have  the  proverb — "Too  many  irons  in  the  fire!'^ 

This  is  diffusion. 

"One  thing  at  a  time,  and  that  done  well 
Is  as  good  a  rule  as  I  can  tell!" 

is  an  admonition  I  learned  as  a  lad.  Success  is  his 
who  concentrates ;  failure  lies  in  diffusion.  "Concentra- 
tion is  power;  diffusion  is  weakness,^^  says  Emerson. 
Study  persons  of  strong  character  among  your  friends. 
They  are  not  the  fickle  ones,  not  those  who  jump  from 
topic  to  topic  in  conversation.  They  are  those  who  can 
tell  a  coherent  story,  and  who  are  not  easily  thrown 
off  their  poise. 

Men  who  succeed  are  those  who  attend  to  their  business, 
that  is : — pay  attention  to  business.  The  rule  for  suc- 
cess in  every  department  of  life,  be  it  desire  for  health, 
happiness,  success,  or  prosperity  is — MIND  YOUR 
OWN   BUSINESS.      First,   have   a  business.     Then, 


22  CONCENTRATION: 

mind  it.  That  is,  put  your  mind  into  your  business. 
Think  of  your  business.  Keep  your  thoughts  upon  your 
business.  MIND— PAY  ATTENTION  TO,  which  is 
merely  saying,  "Concentrate  upon  what  you  are  doing." 
Men  whose  minds  are  off  wool  gathering  when  they 
should  be  attending  to  business,  are  men  who  fail.  Men 
whose  minds  are  full  of  fears,  anxieties  and  doubts, 
fail.  Minds,  uncontrolled,  are  like  horses  uncontrolled ; 
neither  arrive  at  any  desired  end.  They  fly  the  track, 
they  put  no  eye  on  the  goal.  Winners  see  the  goal; 
keep  that  end  in  view  all  the  time. 
Concentration  is  an  ever-present  element  in  all  human 
success  and  if  you  wish  to  succeed  in  applying  the 
Affirmations  of  "Soul  Culture,"  you  must  do  as  all 
successful  persons  have  done,  i.  e.,  concentrate  upon 
them.  In  the  simplest  and  strongest  terms,  make  these 
Affirmations  your  business,  and  mind  your  business. 
M.  Y.  0.  B.,  (mind  your  own  business)  must  be  your 
watchword  of  success.  These  letters  are  of  value  equal 
to  those  to  which  men  attach  so  much  vahie,  those 
granted  by  college  or  king.  Following  the  name  of 
every  successful  person,  I  see  the  invisible  M.  Y.  0.  B., 
which  is  God's  insignia  of  nobility — "A  successful 
man !" 

New  Thought  is  but  bringing  prominently  and  simply 
into  view,  the  good  old  admonition,  "Have  something  to 
do  and  do  it."  Jesus  gave  the  same  when  he  said,  "Not 
every  one  who  saith  to  me  ^Lord !  Lord !'  But  he  that 
doeth  the  will  of  my  Father!"  No  doing  without 
thought,  and  that  thought  is  concentrated  thought. 
Powder  flashed  in  the  pan  never  sends  a  ball  to  any 
mark.      Powder   concentrated  by  the   chamber   of  the 


—THE  ROAD  TO  SUCCESS.  23 

cannon  does  the  work;  tons  can  only  destroy  recklessly 
without  the  chamber. 

The  lesson — Powder  in  pan  has  the  same  power  as  that 
in  cannon.  So  with  men — All  have  equal  power,  "All 
men  are  created  equal/^  in  life,  power  and  possibilities 
of  Spirit.  Some  concentrate  and  win;  others  scatter 
and  lose.  Some  make  a  lot  of  noise,  and  go  off  with 
a  whiz,  like  a  Chinese  pin- wheel;  others  work  silently 
like  the  fuse  of  the  sappers  and  miners,  till  the  moment 
of  action,  then  you  hear  them.  Do  you  take  this  all  in  ? 
You  do  not  as  long  as  you  hold  any  person  or  condition 
or  circumstance  to  blame  for  your  success  or  failure. 
As  long  as  you  thus  hold  circumstances  responsible,  you 
will  never  cure  life's  ills.  You  have  as  much  life,  as 
much  power,  and  as  good  conditions  as  any  other  person. 
We  are  not  all  alike  in  desires,  tendencies,  or  loves ;  but 
for  us,  as  we  are,  the  whole  universe  is  ours.  We  have 
only  to  use  the  power  we  are.  Circumstances  are  op- 
portunities through  which  we  are  to  express  the  power 
we  are.  Emerson  says :  "The  great  heart  will  no  more 
complain  of  the  obstructions  that  make  success  hard, 
than  of  the  iron  walls  of  the  gun  which  hinder  the  shot 
from  scattering.'^ 

From  this,  understand  that  Concentration  is  the  uni- 
versal Law  governing  the  manifestations  of  Power  in 
any  line.  In  what  is  known  as  physics,  concentration 
is  the  secret  of  power.  Mechanics  lies  in  power  to  con- 
centrate the  stream,  wind,  lightning  and  thus  make  it 
possible  to  bring  it  under  direction  and  control.  Dif- 
fused power  cannot  be  directed  or  controlled  and  is 
therefore  subject  only  to  the  laws  of  the  Absolute  and 
the  uses  that  it  has  in  the  Universal  Mind.    Winds  that 


24  CONCENTRATION. 

blow  without  any  human  direction,  streams  that  flow 

without  being  controlled  in  some  channel,  have  use  in 

the  economy  of  Nature,  but  are  not  directly  of  use  to 

man. 

As  soon  as  man  begins  to  concentrate,  not  only  these 

invisible    forces,    but   also   to   concentrate   the   visible 

like  fusing  or  forging  the  minerals,  he  increases  their 

power. 

Concentration  is  the  secret  of  directed  power,  wherever 

man  has  made  it  available.     Emerson  tells  us   that 

Napoleon^s  success  lay  in  concentration,  his  only  rule. 

He  says : — "On  any  point  of  resistance  he  concentrated 

squadron  after  squadron  in  overwhelming  numbers  until 

it  was  swept  out  of  existence." 

When  man  shall  learn  to  still  more  concentrate  power 

he  will  master  aerial  navigation.    Storage  batteries  and 

small  dynamos  and  small  engines  are  opening  the  way. 

Therefore,  when  you  are  learning  concentration,  you 

are  learning  to  use  Power,  in  the  same  manner  as  man 

has  learned  to  use  those  powers  he  has  harnessed  to  his 

machinery. 

Mental  concentration    is    the    application  of  the  one 

method  through  which  all  nature  applies  her  forces  to 

any  particular  end. 

You  are  ever  to  remember  that  you  are  living  in  a 

universe ;  that  all  force  is  one  and  is  subject  to  the  one 

law;  that  methods  of  the  laVs  operation  in  the  visible 

universe    are    parallel    with    methods    in    the    unseen 

universe.      Says    Emerson:      "The    laws    below    are 

sisters    of    the    laws    above !"      Mrs.    Browning    tells 

us:      "There   is   not   a   flower   on   earth,   but   has   its 

counterpart  on  the  Spiritual  side."    They  are  reflections 


—THE  ROAD  TO  SUCCESS.  25 

in  the  slower  vibrations  of  what  is  actual  and  permanent 
in  the  higher.  As  the  picture  in  a  mirror  is  a  reflection 
of  the  object^  so  every  so-called  material  circumstance 
is,  but  the  reflection  of  a  mental  reality,  or  if  you  prefer, 
a  spiritual  reality.  All  laws  are  spiritual  laws.  Or  it 
may  please  you  better  if  we  say,  all  Laws  are  Laws  of 
Mind.  Mind  is  all,  and  All  means  ALL.  It  does  not 
leave  out  Man  or  rock,  angel  or  energy.  ALL  means 
God,  and  God  means  ALL.  You  are  thus  first  of  all  in 
your  demonstration  to  concentrate  the  thoughts  you 
have  had  of  Existence  into  the  OKE  Substance  that 
fills  the  Universe.  You  are  to  affirm  ITnity  until  it 
becomes  a  mental  habit  to  think  from  Unity.  Think 
of  God  as  not  far  away,  but  as  being  ever-present  and 
IN  you.  To  think  of  your  life  as  God's  life;  your 
thought  as  God's  thought;  your  strength  as  God's 
strength ;  your  action  as  God's  action.  You  must  create 
this  habit  of  concentrating  God,  yourself,  and  your 
friends  into  the  All.  You  are  to  accustom  yourself 
never  to  think  of  anything,  or  any  manifestation  as 
separate  from  the  All.  It  is  the  All  that  manifests; 
it  is  the  All  that  thinks,  loves,  acts,  works,  hates,  grows, 
blossoms,  ripens,  and  decays.  You  will  soon  grow  to 
FEEL  God,  as  you  think  of  IT  (or  HIM)  as  present 
in  yourself ;  and  to  think  of  yourself  as  present  in  Him, 
and  of  your  thought  and  deed  as  being  His  thought  and 
deed.  You  will  soon  realize  that  the  idea  of  separateness 
between  yourself  and  the  All  is  the  beginning  of  all 
your  ills. 

Paul  held  and  taught  this  conception  of  Unity.  He  said : 
I  am  persuaded  that  neither  death,  nor  life,  nor  angels,  nor 
principalities,  nor  things  present,  nor  things  to  come,  nor 
powers,  nor  height,  nor  depth,  nor  any  other  creature  shall 
be  able  to  separate  us  from  the  love  of  God! 


26  CONCENTRATION: 


SECTION  IV. 

SOME  CHANNELS  OF  WASTE. 

Work  while  you  work  and   play  while  you  play; 
That  is  the  way  to  be  happy  and  gay. 

— My  Old  School  Reader. 

Too  many  irons  in  the  fire. 

Jack  of  all  trades  and  master  of  none. 

— Old  Proverbs. 

Laurel  crowns  cleave  to  deserts 
And  power  to  him  who  power  exerts. 
Hast  not  thy  share?    On  winged  feet 
Lo,  it  flyeth  thee  to  meet! 

— Emerson. 

While  happiness  is  to  be  desired  and  is  the  source  of 
health  and  power,  being  the  subjective  side,  the  cause 
side  of  these,  it  is  often  confused  with  mere  excitement, 
— especially  the  excitement  of  change, — or  of  stimu- 
lant, and  also  with  mere  pleasure.  Pleasure  arises  in 
the  sensations  of  the  physical  body  and  while  it  is  to 
be  encouraged  as  a  means  and  as  such  becomes  a  source 
of  power,  whenever  sought  as  an  end  it  is  diffusive  of 
power,  destructive  of  happiness,  through  the  reactions 
that  follow,  and  thus  productive  of  failure  in  line  of 
health  and  a  successful  life.  Rational  pleasures  are  to 
be  sought  temperately.  With  Self-Control  they  are 
healthful.  Intemperate  use  is  diffusion,  weakness.  All 
emotions  not  controlled — all  intemperance  in  any  form, 
— is  the  opposite  of  that  concentration,  which  is  the 
"Road  to  Success.^^  It  is  the  concentration  of  mere 
physical  enjoyment,  and  since  all  power  is  Mind,   (or 


—THE  ROAD  TO  SUCCESS.  27 

Spirit)  and  not  body,  to  concentrate  upon  the  physical 
in  any  form,  is  to  close,  to  a  greater  or  less  degree,  the 
channels  of  inspiration  of  Spirit,  which  is  life. 
The  physical  is  the  animal  side  of  Man.  And  until  he 
attains  mastery  over  the  flesh,  it  is  as  natural  to  concen- 
trate upon  physical  enjoyment  as  do  the  lambs  and 
colts.  This  is  the  exuberance  of  animal  Hfe.  Man  can 
keep  this  exuberance  down  to  what  is  termed  old  age 
will  he  be  temperate,  and  the  word  means — Self  Con- 
trolled. Under  right  thought,  all  this  animal  spirit  is 
curbed,  and  reined,  and  guided  by  the  Master — Soul. 
Through  this  mastery  it  is  possible  to  avoid  disease, 
unhappiness,  poverty  and  even  physical  death  by  ripen- 
ing out  of  physical  conditions  through  some  form  of  de- 
materialization. 

It  is  not  because  there  is  anything  inherently  wrong  in 
this,  that  I  refer  to  the  fads,  follies,  fashions  and  social 
excitements.  Only  so  far  as  they  are  indulged  in  to 
kill  time;  are  taken  up  because  they  are  in  the  air; 
indulged  in  to  emulate  or  to  vie  with  others;  enjoyed 
with  no  serious  purpose;  and  allowed  to  absorb  time, 
attention  and  labor  that,  would  we  win  Success, — 
would  lead  to  Success.  I  am  writing  only  for  those 
who  are  willing  to  purchase  success. 
"Laurel  crowns  cleave  to  deserts"  and  no  one  ever  won 
the  crowning  success  who  did  not  buy  it  with  a  price. 
And  no  one  wins  social  distinction,  or  place  in  the 
fashionable,  political,  or  athletic  world,  who  did  not 
pay  for  it  by  losing  success  in  other  fields. 

"In  the  devil's  booth  all  things  are  sold, 
Each  ounce  of  dross  costs  its  ounce  of  gold." 

"It  is  natural  to  concentrate  upon  pleasure,"  it  is  said, 


28  CONCENTRATION: 

and  also: — "It  is  natural  to  concentrate  under  excite- 
ment l"  Yes :  but  is  it  well  ?  Has  not  man  a  higher 
motive?  Anger,  jealousy,  envy,  hatred,  avarice  and 
kindred  passions  are  concentrative  and  belong  naturally 
to  man;  but  unfolding  man  leaves  these  behind  and 
finds  happiness,  power,  prosperity  in  concentrating  upon 
their  opposites. 

It  is  because,  all  forms  of  concentration  that  have  not 
behind  them  noble  ideals,  are  diffusive  of  power  and 
weakening  to  character;  because  they  are  a  form  of  in- 
temperance; because  they  are  manifestations  of  a  lack 
of  self-control,  of  self-sufficiency,  that,  for  those  who 
have  a  desire  to  nobly  win,  I  mention  them  here. 
Society  has  much  "busy  idleness/^  The  ladies  crochet, 
make  crazy  quilts,  take  up  china  painting  and  kindred 
fads  to  "kill  time."  Not  with  any  serious  purpose,  but 
because  they  don't  know  what  else  to  do,  or  seek  them 
to  show  their  productions  for  the  approval  or  envy  of 
neighbors.  There  is  much  dissipation  in  what  is  termed 
"Art."  "Art  is  man  added  to  Nature,"  but  there  seems 
to  be  no  purpose  "to  add"  in  much  that  today  passes  by 
that  name.  The  test?  Only  a  few  years  and  all  these 
productions  are  relegated  to  the  lumber  room.  The 
productions  of  real  Art,  live.  True,  some  unfoldment 
comes  to  those  who  really  enjoy;  who  really  love  the 
work ;  who  truly  have  a  real  desire ;  but  when  it  is  done 
only  because  others  are  painting;  because  "I  must  do 
something"  it  is  a  diffusion  of  power  and  an  element  of 
weakness. 

To  follow  this  course  is  to  take  the  road  to  failure.    Con- 
centration upon  any  occupation  means  success  in  it. 
Have  a  purpose  in  what  you  do  and  work  with  a  will. 


—THE  ROAD  TO  SUCCESS.  29 

Whatever  is  done  to  kill  time ;  to  help  one  forget  one's 
self,  because  it  is  the  fad^  or  because  society  demands 
it,  is  weakness.  "Conformity  is  weakness/'  says  Em- 
erson. 

Companionship,  social  intercourse,  exchange  of  affec- 
tionate and  love  expressions  are  sources  of  power.  Man 
is  a  social  being  and  needs  to  mingle  with  his  kind,  but 
what  are  known  as  "social  functions"  are  diffusive  and 
interfere  with  Success,  as  determined  in  "Introduction." 
What  is  termed  "society"  is  dissipation;  a  loss  of  op- 
portunity and  power  and  leads  to  ill  health  and  failure. 
Many  who  feel  compelled  to  live  lives  in  conformity  to 
social  demands  have  said  to  me,  both  men  and  women, 
"Society  is  hell !"  Physicians  tell  me  so  and  the 
records  of  sanitariums  and  homes  echo, — "Hell !"  Why  ? 
Because  it  is  the  opposite  of  Peace — Eest — Happiness — 
Health. 

Concentration  upon  pleasure  for  its  own  sake,  kills. 
Games  are  right  and  necessary  in  their  place.  They 
are  means  of  relaxing;  a  means  of  rest  from  our  over 
strenuous  life.  But  the  tendency  is  to  carry  the  same 
strenuousness  into  the  game,  and  instead  of  enjoying 
the  game,  enjoy  the  winning.  And  there  is  no  more 
nerve  wearing  and  diffusive  means  than  gambling  in 
any  form,  be  it  at  stock  board,  roulette  table  or  at  any 
thing  where  there  is  striving  to  win.  Let  me  tell  you 
something : — when  you  become  so  interested  in  winning 
as  to  lose  the  enjoyment  of  each  step  of  the  game — 
stop !  I  will  not  play  a  second  game  with  any  one  who 
"crows"  over  his  winnings,  or  who  feels  bad  over  his 
failures.  And  I  would  prefer  he  would,  like  myself, 
forget  to  name  who  won  the  evening  before.     To  play 


30  CONCENTRATION: 

in  any  other  thought  than  that  of  enjoyment  of  expres- 
sion at  the  time,  is  not  to  make  the  game  restful,  but 
only  to  change  the  kind  of  excitement.  To  change  from 
concentration  of  business  to  concentration  in  winnings 
is  not  to  change  the  principle,  is  not  rest. 
The  same  is  true  of  athletic  contests.  The  motive  de- 
termines the  benefit.  Herbert  Spencer  loved  to  relax 
at  billiards.  A  young  man  once  played  with  him  who 
showed  great  skill  and  declared  that  he  was  champion 
at  the  game. — "I  am  sorry  to  hear  it/^  said  the  phil- 
osopher. Time,  skill,  effort  and  life  wasted  for  that 
which  represented  no  power,  no  real  success. 

President  Livermore  said  to  us  at  Meadville:  "Young 
men,  you  cannot  devote  yourselves  to  society  and  at 
the  same  time  attend  to  your  studies !" 

"Choose  this  day  whom  you  wdll  serve,"  says  nature. 
You  cannot  have  success  on  a  high  ideal  plane  and  at 
the  same  time  in  a  lower  one.  Cannot  win  in  business, 
art,  politics,  literature,  or  any  chosen  field,  and  dissipate 
your  time,  thought  and  power  in  other  fields.  Concen- 
trate upon  some  chosen  ones  and  use  all  others  as  a 
means  of  relaxation  and  rest. 

"Too  many  irons  in  the  fire !"  is  the  old  proverb.  Have 
one  purpose.  Concentrate  and  stick,  is  the  soul  of 
success. 

I  recently  heard  a  young  man  in  conversation  with  a 
young  lady  say — "No,  I  had  to  give  up  night  school ;  I 
had  too  much  to  do !"  and  a  few  moments  later  I  over- 
heard him  say:  "I  was  at  the  theatre  a  few  evenings 
ago,  and  with  skating  rink  and  theatre  I  shall  be  out 
every  night  this  week."     The  probabilities  are  that  in 


—THE  ROAD  TO  SUOCESS.  31 

a  few  years  he  will  complain  of  his  "luck,"  because 
others  get  promoted  over  him.  He  had  concentrated 
upon  pleasure,  the  sensations  of  the  physical  man. 
Gossip,  the  daily  papers,  latest  novel,  the  new  dance, 
and  other  trifles  occupy  too  much  time  for  health  and 
success.  I  have  listened  to  conversations  between  men 
on  some  political  trifle  and  between  women  on  some 
society  gossip  for  over  fifteen  minutes  that  was  not 
worth  a  passing  thought.  This  loss  of  life  means  loss 
of  health  and   success. 

Yet  these  people  will  tell  me  they  cannot  concentrate. 
True  they  have  not  learned  the  law  of  mastery — concen- 
tration at  will, — but  they  naturally  concentrate  upon 
the  thought  that  comes  under  present  desire,  or  habit. 
What  shall  these  do?  Follow  the  advice  given  in 
Matthew: — "Eepent," — for  the  kingdom  of  God  is  at 
hand  I"  Eepent ; — turn  about ; — do  the  opposite.  Think 
the  opposite.  "At  hand."  Yes,  reach  forth  and  take 
it.  It  is  waiting  for  you — is  the  realization  of  your 
Ideal  of  happiness  and  success. 


32  CONCENTRATION: 

SECTION  V. 

"I  AM  LIFE/' 

I  am  the  Way,  the  Truth  and  the  Life. 

— Jesus. 

The  infinite  always  is  silent,  'tis  only  the  finite  that  speaks. 

— John  Boyle  O'Reiley. 

The  granite  rocks  disorganize 

To  feed  the  hungry  Life  they  bear! 
The  very  moss  drinks  daily  Life, 

From  out  the  viewless  air. 

— J.  L.  McCreary. 
I  am  the  Way,  the  Truth  and  Light; 

In  me  all  Being  flows. 
I'm  one  with  rock  and   star  so  bright. 

God's   spark  within  me  glows. 

— 8am  Exton  FOulds. 

There  is  hut  one  Life  and  I  am  that  Life.  This  thought 
you  are  to  hold  and  thus  concentrate  Life  into  One  and 
not  as  in  the  past  diffuse  and  limit  it  in  amount.  ALL 
the  one  life  is  mine.  With  this  thought  you  cannot 
either  lose  or  waste.  All  life  is  yours  and  you  may  use 
it  as  you  choose.  You  have  no  less  life  at  any  moment 
than  you  had  at  first.  You  have  as  much  at  80  years 
as  you  had  at  birth.  Under  the  old  thought  habit  of 
scattering  and  diffusing  Life,  you  were  at  times  weak, 
weary,  or  ill.  Under  the  New  Thought  you  are  never 
thus,  but  are  at  all  times  One  with  the  All-Life. 
Learn  to  think  from  this  thought  of  life.  Concentrate 
upon  it.  Do  not  lot  your  mind  wander  off  into  old  chan- 
nels, but  keep  your  attention  fixed  always  upon  some 
aspect  of  the  ONE. 

It  is  an  excellent  practice  to  image  yourself  as  an  inlet 
of  an  infinite  ocean  of  Life.    Imagine  a  current  setting 


—THE  ROAD  TO  SUCCESS.  33 

into  you  as  a  bay,  just  as  it  comes  through  our  beautiful 
Golden  Gate;  and  as  it  fills  this  magnificent  bay,  so 
see  Life  fill  you.  Say  to  yourself, — "I  am  a  bay  filled 
through  the  Golden  Gate  of  Love  from  the  Infinite 
ocean  of  Life.  The  tide  never  ebbs.  I  am  at  all  times 
full.  I  have  but  to  let  Life  flow  through  me  into  ex- 
pression, and  as  fast  as  I  let  it  flow  out,  I  am  filled 
again.  Thus  I  have  life  only  as  I  give  it  expression. 
O  Life;  Healthful  Life;  Beautiful  Life.  Mine  now 
and  forever!'^    Be  this  your  constant  song. 

Constantly  keeping  a  chosen  thought  uppermost  is  Con- 
centration. As  you  practice  it  will  grow  easier,  till  you 
will  have  formed  the  habit  of  thinking  of  God,  of  Life 
as  One,  and  then  think  of  yourself  as  God  and  as  Life 
in  manifestation.  You  will  grow  to  think  of  the  full- 
ness of  life,  just  as  you  have  been  accustomed  to  think 
of  your  want  of  life. 

Mental  habits  are  the  only  habits  you  should  cultivate 
or  allow.  There  are  good  mental  habits  but  there  are 
no  good  habits  in  the  objective  life.  To  think  rightly  is 
to  allow  fullest  liberty  in  the  objective  life,  because 
Thought  cannot  take  the  same  objective  form  through 
you  to-day,  as  it  did  when  you  were  five  years  old,  or 
as  it  did  when  you  were  ten,  or  twenty  or  thirty  years 
of  age.  As  you  change,  your  environment  changes; 
you  will  find  your  thought  of  Unity  taking  a  new  physi- 
cal manifestation.  For  instance — You  may  to-day, 
under  the  thought  of  the  Infinity-of-Life,  find  it  to 
your  happiness  to  attend  theatre  or  attend  the  sick,  and 
be  up  all  night,  but  your  ordinary  habit  is  to  retire  early. 
But  when  you  make  it  a  habit  to  retire  early  you 
fetter  yourself,  and  will  feel  the  loss  when  you  do  not. 


34  CONCENTRATION: 

Create  the  mental  habit  of  doing  what  you  think  is 
best  at  the  time  and  for  the  occasion  and  you  will  either 
retire  or  remain  up  with  equal  physical  comfort. 
Mental  habits  are  formed  from  Principle,  from  love  of 
right;  ph5^sical  habits  are  formed  from  attention  to 
details.  Principles  have  millions  of  applications.  Create 
a  habit  of  temperance  and  you  will  need  no  pledge,  and 
any  pledge  will  fetter  you  when  you  wish  a  larger 
liberty.  A  mental  habit  of  thinking  no  evil  will  keep 
you  from  fault-finding  and  criticism,  while  a  habit  of 
overlooking  the  faults  of  others  will  shut  you  out  from 
seeing  them  and  open  the  better  to  your  vision. 
Mental  habits  are  results  of  demonstration  along  certain 
thought  lines.  "I  don't  demonstrate  V  Why  ?  Because 
you  have  created  a  mental  habit  of  letting  the  mind 
run  at  random.  Create  a  new  habit.  How  ?  By  doing 
as  you  always  have  done  save  to  choose  your  thought. 
There  is  no  change  in  law  or  method.  It  is  a  simple 
thing  to  choose  other  thoughts  where  you  have  been 
thinking  unpleasant  ones.  This  requires  will  and  effort 
till  you  create  the  habit  and  then  the  right  thought  will 
think  itself.  Automatism  is  to  be  made  of  conscious 
use ;  habit  is  automatism,.  By  a  course  of  right  thinking 
we  change  nerve  tissue;  build  cells  which  like  storage 
batteries  hold  the  thought  and,  when  cells  enough  have 
been  created,  they  do  the  work  without  our  conscious 
volition.  We  materialize  our  thoughts  and  our  will 
into  muscle  and  nerve.  Gray  matter  is  secreted  in  the 
ends  of  the  fingers  of  the  blind^  and  in  the  fingers  of 
the  pianist  and  the  deft  artisan.  The  fingers  do  not 
think,  but  the  thought  out  of  which  they  have  been 
made,  does  the  work.    So  is  it  in  any  line  of  labor ;  the 


—THE  ROAD  TO  SUCCESS.  35 

body  becomes  materialized  so  that  the  less  of  conscious 
thought  is  put  upon  it  the  better  work  it  does.  This 
is  done  under  the  universal  Law  of  Concentration.  You 
are  consciously  to  obey  the  Law  to  a  chosen  end,  as  you 
have  in  the  past  involuntarily  and  unconsciously  obeyed 
it,  to  an  end  chosen  for  you  by  necessity.  In  the  old 
thought  and  labor  you  were  slave ;  in  the  New  Thought 
you  are  Master  through  Self-direction. 

You  do  not  suffer  from  lack  in  concentration,  for  with- 
out concentration  nothing  is  done.  Every  step  you  take 
and  every  word  you  speak  is  the  result  of  concentration. 
What  you  complain  of  arises  from  a  lack  of  proper 
thought  choice.  People  differ  in  the  power  to  concen- 
trate at  will  upon  a  chosen  thought  and  their  power  to 
hold  by  will  to  a  chosen  thought  for  any  definite  time. 
Some  people  have  persistence  and  consecutiveness  while 
others  are  fickle,  veering,  and  easily  discouraged.  But 
discouragement,  fear,  grief,  pain,  sorrow,  worry,,  anx- 
iety, jealousy,  anger,  and  v^eariness  are  all  like  their 
opposites,  the  results  of  concentration.  What  is  the 
difference  ?  Is  it  because  some  persons  possess  less  will  ? 
Can  one  person  have  more  Life  than  another?  Each 
one  has  All  Life  and  can  draw  at  will.  Can  a  person 
then  have  less  will  than  another  ?  The  All- Will  belongs 
to  each,  and  each  has  all  of  the  All- Will  that  he  or  she 
wills  to  use.  There  is  no  such  thing  as  a  weak  or  a 
strong  will,  any  more  than  there  is  a  strong  or  a  weak 
life.  There  may  be  a  strong  or  weak  manifestation 
of  life  and  will  through  the  same  individual.  No  per- 
son exercises  the  will  in  the  same  way  at  all  times.  The 
very  fact  that  we  notice  the  difference  between  the  ex- 
ercise of  will  on  occasion,  is  evidence  that  will  is  limit- 
less and  we  can  use  all  we  desire.  Therefore  it  is  not 
a  valid  excuse  for  a  person  to  say  of  another,  "He  has 
a  stronger  will  than  mine!^^  because  each  person  has 
a  will  of  equal  strength.  It  is  merely  a  question  of 
how  you  will  to  use  the  Ego  as  Will. 


36  CONCENTRATION: 


SECTION  VI. 

HOW  SHALL  I   CONCENTEATE. 

Let  your  yea  be  yea  and  your  nay  be  nay. 

— Jesus. 
Whatsoever  things  are  lovely  and  of  good  repute,  think  on 
these  things. 

— Paul. 

No  man  can  choose  what  coming  hours  may  bring 

To  him  of  need,  of  joy,  or  suffering; 

But  what  his  soul  shall  bring  unto  each  hour 

To  meet  its  challenge — this  is  his  power. 

— Priscilla  Leonard. 
It  is  profanation  for  you  to  ask  hoiv  Life  will  do  its 
work  tomorrow.  It  is  sacrilegious  after  telling  Life, 
the  Omnipotent  and  the  Omniscient  what  you  desire, 
for  you  to  put  your  finger  into  the  work.  You  are  to 
let  the  One  in  the  sub-conscious  materialize  your  ideal. 
Every  time  you  interfere  with  Life,  you  get  burnt 
fingers.  Your  entire  business  is  to  build  in  the  Ideal. 
When  you  have  created  the  mental  image  you  are  to 
concentrate  upon  that  image  and  LET  the  MASTER 
BUILDEE— LIFE  (GOD),  do  the  work  while  you  en- 
joy the  conditions  that  come  to  you. 
I  think  this  advice  is  plain;  Concentrate  upon  the 
mental  image  and  let  that  image,  through  the  operation 
of  mental  laws,  direct  the  8oul  in  the  manifestation. 
Simply  do  your  work  in  imagination;  do  your  work  by 
thinking.  God  will  through  necessity  do  the  rest. 
Thhiking  is  all  you  can  do.  Therefore  watch  your 
thoughts  and  when  they  are  inclined  to  stray  away  from 
the  chosen  image,  bring  them  back.  Soon  the  Will 
by  that  faculty  must  body  itself  forth  in  the  physical 


—THE  ROAD  TO  SUCCESS.  37 

becomes  so  trained  to  the  fact  that  it  must  hold  to  the 
chosen  picture,  that  it  will  keep  your  thoughts  from 
straying.  This  is  the  ultimate  of  Concentration;  it 
brings  REALIZATION;  then  you  and  the  mental 
image  become  one. 

I  give  you  in  this  connection  a  fine  mental  picture  to 
hold  of  your  power,  from  Edwin  Arnold's  "Light  of 
Asia  V  Concentrate  upon  it  till  it  becomes  your  thought 
of  yourself,  as  body,  as  Will,  and  as  Infinite  Life. 
Look  upon  Spirit  as  the  rider!   take 
The  body  for  the  chariot  and  the  Will 
As  charioteer!     Regard  the  Mind  as  reins; 
The  senses  steeds,  and  things  of  sense 
The  ways  they  trample  on.     So  is  the  Soul 
The  Lord  that  owneth  spirit,  body,  will. 
Mind,  senses,  all.     Itself  unowned. 

Thus  think  the  wise! 
He  who  is  unwise,  drives  with  reins 
Slack  on  the  neck  o'  the  senses,  then  they  romp 
Like  restless  horses  of  a  charioteer. 
He  that  is  wise,  with  watchful  mind  and  firm. 
Calms  these  wild  fires,  so  they  go  fair  and  straight 
Like  well-trained  horses  of  a  charioteer. 
The  imagination  is  the  real  creator.     The  pictures  it 
creates  become   objective   realities.     Henry   Wood   de- 
serves a  much  greater  recognition  than  he  has  yet  re- 
ceived for  the  Principle  he  lays  down  in  his  "Ideal 
Suggestion."     This   form   of   Suggestion   controls  the 
life.    The  ideal  is  the  real  in  Spirit  and  that  which  is 
spiritually  created  must  take  objective  form.    As  every 
picture  was  first  a  mental  image  in  the  mind  of  painter, 
and  painted  itself;  as  each  statue  was  first  a  mental 
picture  in  the  mind  of  sculptor ;  as  palace,  hut,  or  stable 
in  the  mind  of  architect  was  once  a  mental  picture; 
so  every  form  of  human  expression  is  in  the  inception 
a  mental  image,  created  upon,  or  by,  or  through,  the 
Imagination.     Wliat  is  once  impressed  upon  the  mind 


38  CONCENTRATION; 

universe.  Pictures  created  by  Affirmations  become,  ac- 
cording to  the  fidelity  with  which  they  are  held  imaged 
forth  in  the  body.  "According  to  the  fidelity  with 
which  they  >are  held."  Note  this  well.  Eest  here  and 
give  the  thought  time  to  affect  the  body.  Eest  an  hour 
and  it  will  have  an  hour^s  effect.  Make  a  mental  habit 
of  holding  this  thought  constantly  as  a  picture,  to  the 
exclusion  of  all  pictures  that  mar,  and  it  becomes  re- 
flected in  the  body  as  does  the  mental  image  in  mind 
of  artist  or  workman.  "Let  your  yea  he  yea." 
This  is  why  you  are  at  all  times  to  keep  before  yourself 
the  picture  of  health,  happiness,  and  success.  "Think 
on  these  things."  These  pictures  are  to  be  held  as 
realities  in  Principle;  not  to  be  wrought  out  in  detail, 
save  as  day  by  day,  the  need  of  detail  comes.  As  soon 
as  mentally  created,  they  are  Powers  and  Eealities  in 
the  Soul  Eealm.  There  alone  you  have  creative  power. 
Details  are  the  objective  conditions  with  which  you  are 
to  deal  with  reason  when  the  time  for  reasoning  comes. 
"NOW  is  the  accepted  time"  for  you  to  deal  with  Prin- 
ciple. Principle  will  take  care  of  the  detail  that  now 
is,  and  with  other  details,  when  the  evolution  of  the 
mental  image  brings  them  into  the  present. 
Make  not  the  mistake  of  planning  the  how,  and  the  way, 
in  which  this  mental  image  will  objectify.  That  is 
not  your  business.  Do  not  think  on  these  things.  Give 
to  Life  the  outline  of  what  you  desire  and  trust  Life. 
Let  Life  carry  out  your  desire.  Life  is  omnipotent  and 
is  the  only  builder.  Life  will  decide  when  to  give  the 
picture  objective  form.  Hold  the  picture  in  your  mind 
and  trust.  Be  yourself  the  architect;  Life  is  the  work- 
man. Keep  your  hands  off.  The  only  work  for  you 
is: — Think,  Concentrate,  and  Trust. 


-THE  ROAD  TO  SUCCESS.  39 


SECTION  VII. 


THE  WILL. 

The  education  of  the  Will  is  the  object  of  our  existence. 

— Emerson. 
O  living  Will  that  shalt  endure 
When  all  that  seems  shall  suffer  shock. 

— Tennyson. 

The  mind  of  a  human  organism  can,  by  effort  of  will, 
properly  directed,  produce  measurable  changes  in  the 
chemistry  of  the  secretions  and  excretions;  in  the  vasor 
motor  blood  supply  to  areas  and  organs,  and  in  the  temper- 
ature selected  areas,  and  so  on.  All  of  this  goes  to  prove 
that  the  mind  has  a  direct  effect  upon  the  functioning  of 
the  cells  that  compose  an  organ,  and  that  if  we  can  prop- 
erly train  the  mind,  we  can  produce  definite  effects  upon 
any  physiological  function. 

— Professor  Elmer  Gates. 

An  educated  Will  then  is  the  first  necessity  to  happiness, 

health  and  prosperity.     The  Will  should  be  as  subject 

to  desire  in  us  as  are  the  muscles  of  the  gymnast  to 

his  will.     This  can  be  done  by  creating  right  mental 

habits  through  voluntary  concentration. 

The  mechanic  educates  his  hand  to  hold  the  saw;  the 

engineer  his  to  hold  the  throttle ;  the  pianist,  his  fingers 

to  play;  till  it  is  now  '^^second  nature^^  for  them  to 

obey.     In  like  manner  can  the  Will  be  cultivated  in 

other  directions.     Its  function  is  to  obey;  to  carry  out 

the  orders  of  the  judgment.    When  it  has  been  trained 

to  stick  to  a  thought,  it  is  easy,  and  we  say,  "A  person 

of  trained  will  I"    But  if  the  thought  wanders  then  we 

say,  "Weak  will!"    But  the  Will  is  equally  strong  in 

both  cases.     It  takes  as  strong  a  Will  not  to  do  as  it 


40  CONCENTRATION: 

does  to  do ;  as  much  Will  to  sit  in  the  chair  as  it  does 
to  get  up ;  as  much  to  stop  walking  as  to  start ;  as  much 
to  refrain,  as  it  does  to  perform.  "I  can!"  "I  can't!" 
and  "I  won't!"  require  an  equal  expression  of  Will. 
But  when  we  have  trained  the  Will  to  our  decision,  "I 
can't !"  then  it  is  easy,  ^^natural,"  for  us  to  say  "I  can't." 
When  we  have  trained  it  to  our  decision,  "I  don't," 
that  is  also  easy;  but  when  we  have  trained  it  to  say, 
"I  can,"  it  is  equally  easy  to  say  "I  can,"  and  to  do. 
The  trouble  v^ith  the  majority  of  persons  is  that  they 
never  have  been  trained  into  habits  of  self-reliance  and 
self-assertion.  Lacking  these  it  is  natural,  because  it 
is  habit  to  say,  "I  can't."  In  fact,  it  says  itself,  so 
accustomed  are  they  to  say  and  to  think,  "I  can't."  "I 
can't"  is  really  "I  won't  try !"  "Can't"  means,  I  will 
not  will  to  do.  Therefore  when  you  tell  me  that  you 
do  not  concentrate  because  you  "lack  Will,"  this  is  not 
the  fact.  You  really  tell  me  that  you  have  created  a 
habit  of  letting  yourself  as  Will  drift  v^ithout  conscious 
direction.  All  you  have  to  do  to  v^dn  your  desires  is  to 
train  yourself  as  Will  through  Affirmation,  till  it  is  as 
natural  and  easy  for  you  to  say  "I  can !"  as  it  is  now 
for  you  to  fear,  doubt  and  say,  "I  can't."  This  Affirm- 
ation, "I  CAN !"  is  born  of  the  consciousness  of  ability 
to  do  because  you  possess  All-Life  and  All-Will,  and 
may  use  as  much  as  you  desire.  You  do  use  at  all  times 
as  much  as  you  have  trained  yourself  by  thought  to  use. 
Would  you  possess  the  power  of  self -direction,  you  must 
have  power  to  choose  your  thought,  and  to  hold  it  as 
long  as  you  choose ;  have  power  to  shut  out  all  thoughts 
tliat  weaken  or  interfere ;  that  make  sick  or  timid ;  must 
have  the  power  as  trained  Will  to  hold,  because  yon 


—THE  ROAD  TO  SUCCESS.  41 

choose,  pleasant  thoughts  of  health,  success  and  happi- 
ness. VOLUNTAEY  CONCENTRATION"  is  the  se- 
cret of  personal  power;  is  the  secret  of  all  who  have 
won  in  lifers  battles.  These  victors  decided  to  think 
success,  and  nothing  but  success,  and  to  never  give  up, 
thus  from  the  very  jaws  of  defeat,  to  win  the  mead  of 
victory. 

Concentration  is  but  sticking  as  Will  to  the  thought 
you  have  chosen.  It  is  thinking  "I  will."  I  am  asked, 
''Shall  I  affirm  all  the  time?''  I  answer, — Should  you 
spend  all  your  time  thinking  or  saying  ''I  can !"  and 
"I  will,''  you  would  do  nothing  else.  Think  "I  can," 
and  "I  will"  whenever  opposite  thoughts  w^ould  enter 
the  mind.  Sit  quietly  a  few  minutes  each  day,  by 
yourself  with  the  chosen  thought  and  hold  it  because 
you  choose  to  hold  it.  While  you  thus  concentrate 
voluntarily,  keep  all  other  thoughts  out  of  your  mind 
by  willing  them  out.  I  will  to  think  thus.  This  is  not 
easy.  You  little  realize  how  you  have  encouraged 
tramp  thoughts,  unwelcome  thoughts,  uncalled  thoughts, 
"calling"  thoughts,  superficial  thoughts,  until  you  be- 
gin to  direct  your  mind.  You  then  find  how  unstable 
you  are  as  Will.  You  find  as  one  of  my  pupils  said 
v^hen  she  first  tried  to  enter  the  Silence,  "Every  other 
thought,  I  ever  had,  came  calling !"  We  have  not  been 
trained  to  choose  our  thoughts,  and  are  too  much  of  the 
time  subject  to  wandering,  vagabond,  tramp  thoughts 
that  finding  us  undirected,  pick  us  up  and  abide  with  us. 
It  is  important  that  you  fully  comprehend  what  is  meant 
by  "Going  into  the  Silence  !"  It  is  voluntary  concentra- 
tion. It  is  wilful  concentration.  It  is  concentration 
upon  a  chosen  thought.    It  is  doing  voluntarily  and  with 


42  CONCENTRATION : 

a  determined  purpose  that  which  you  have  been  letting 
yourself  do  involuntarily  all  your  life.  You  have 
learned  that  when  you  decide  to  do  a  thing  and  get 
up  your  grit, — will  to  do  it, — you  can  do  it.  Now  what 
you  do,  in  case  of  necessity,  or  under  the  stress  of 
^^must,"  or  when  you  develop  a  positive  determination, 
you  are  to  create  into  habit  of  doing  consciously  all 
the  time.  By  this  time  you  will  have  preceived  that 
what  you  are  learning  is  not  something  for  occasions, 
but  something  for  all  time.  You  are  changing  your 
manner  of  life,  through  this  change  of  mental  habit 
and  learning,  through  thinking  in  the  New  Thought 
method,  to  live  New  Thought. 

Success  goes  thus  invariably  with  a  certain  plus  or  posi- 
tive power;  an  ounce  of  power  must  balance  an  ounce  of 
weight.  And  though  a  man  cannot  return  to  his  mother's 
womb  and  be  born  with  new  amounts  of  vivacity,  yet  there 
are  two  economies  which  are  the  best  succedanea  which 
the  case  admits.  The  first  is  the  stopping  off  decisively 
our  miscellaneous  activity  and  concentrating  our  force  on 
one  or  a  few  points:  as  the  gardener,  by  severe  pruning, 
forces  the  sap  into  one  or  two  vigorous  limbs,  instead  of 
suffering  it  to  spindle  into  a  sheaf  of  twigs. 

— Emerson  in  ''Power." 


—THE  ROAD  TO  SUCCESS.  43 


SECTION  VIII. 


HABITS. 

You   cannot  dream  yourself  into  a  character;    you  must 
hammer  and  forge  yourself  into  one. 

— Anon. 

We  must  build  the  ladder  by  which  we  rise 
And  climb  to  its  summit,  round  by  round. 

— /.  G.  Holland. 
If  my  mind  is  not  engaged  in  the  worship,  it  is  as  if  1 
worshiped  not. 

— Confucius. 

We  are  creatures  of  habits^  most  of  which  we  have 
formed  involuiitarily,  or  at  best  in  ignorance  of  the 
Law.  Now  we  are  beginning  to  learn  and  to  live  in 
conscious  and  intelligent  use  of  the  Law. 
Under  necessity  the  bookkeeper  concentrates  upon  his 
colimm  of  figures  and  hears  not  the  noises  about  him. 
Under  necessity  the  workman  learns  to  concentrate  upon 
his  machine^,  his  tools,  his  material,  and  to  hear  and 
to  think  of  nothing  else.  Under  necessity  the  musician 
and  the  artist  concentrate  upon  their  task.  Under  the 
same  necessity  the  mother  attends  to  her  duties  unheed- 
ing what  is  going  on  about  her.  So  with  all  successful 
business  men.  They  learn  to  mind  their  business;  to 
concentrate  their  thought  upon  it.  So  with  us,  when 
we  are  interested  in  music,  in  a  play,  or  conversation, 
or  in  the  communion  of  love's  expression.  Concentrated 
upon  the  thing  in  hand,  we  think  of  nothing  else.  This 
condition  you  are  to  cultivate.  It  is  the  rapt  condition 
of  the  saint;  the  condition  of  prayer;  the  condition  of 


44  CONCENTRATION: 

hysteria;  the  condition  of  meditation;  the  condition  of 
absent-mindedness.  All  these  we  enter  into  instinct- 
ively. Yon  are  to  learn  to  enter  them  at  will,  and  to 
understand  the  method  and  the  purpose.  Drifting  is 
not  navigation.  Neither  are  these  instinctive  conditions, 
— even  though  they  are  productive  of  good, — self-con- 
trol. All  instructions  under  the  New  Thought  name 
lead  to  self-control,  which  is  the  culmination  of  all  true 
education. 

Paul  enumerated  the  '^fruits  of  the  Spirit^'  thus, — 
"Love,  joy,  peace,  long  suffering,  kindness,  faithfulness, 
meekness,  temperance.^'  Temperance  is  also  given  in 
the  margin  of  the  revised  edition  as  "self-control,^' 
which  is  the  pure  meaning  of  the  word.  Therefore 
temperance  is  the  realization  of  spiritual  consciousness. 
Temperance  is  self-control;  is  man's  coming  into  his 
inheritance  of  power;  is  man  taking  possession  of  that 
kingdom  which  is  his.  He  can  never  take  it  until  he 
shall  realize  that  he  is  one  with  Infinity. 
This  is  accomplished  only  by  hammering  and  forging 
the  Self  into  the  expression  desired.  "Man  is  a  bundle 
of  habits,"  says  Emerson.  Whence  come  they?  Many 
by  inheritance.  Are  they  mine  or  do  I  belong  to  them  ? 
Only  that  which  I  appropriate  from  heredity  by  choice, 
belongs  to  me.  All  the  rest  if  I  continue  to  manifest 
it,  I  belong  to.  Heredity  owns  me  till  I  convert  it  to 
my  desire.  That  which  I  do  not  thus  choose  and  which 
yet  remains  in  me,  is  uncontrolled  tendencies  which  bear 
me  on  as  wind  bears  the  leaf  and  as  hunger  bears  the 
wolf.  I  yield  to  them  and  when  the  habit  of  yielding: 
is  formed,  I  excuse  myself  by  saying: — "Heredity.  I 
can't  master."     When  the  fact  is,  I  have  not  tried. 


—THE  ROAD  TO  SUCCESS.  45 

Without  attempting  to  stem  the  current,  or  to  direct 
the  bark  of  my  life,  I  have  been  content  to  drift. 
This  habit  of  submission  to  tendencies  is  non-human. 
It  belongs  to  the  brute.  Man  has  not  yet  left  heredity 
behind.  My  humanity  consists  in  my  power  to  choose. 
My  power  to  move,  to  think.  He  who  does  not  exercise 
his  power  of  choice  is  losing  his  opportunity  of  self- 
hood. 

Habits  are  unconsciously  formed.  They  grow  while 
we  are  sleeping.  They  are  born  of  our  thoughts,  and 
thoughts  we  take  into  our  sleeping  hours  are  most 
potent  in  controlling  our  lives. 

For  this  reason  mental  habits  have  power  over  us. 
Mental  habits  are  the  only  ones  to  cultivate,  are  the 
only  habits  that  are  good.  Any  habit  of  physical  ex- 
pression is  bad,  because  it  becomes  a  fetter.  But  a 
correct  mental  habit  is  based  upon  Principle,  and  leaves 
the  individual  free  to  act  as  he  feels  is  right  under 
all  conditions. 

Cultivate  the  habit  of  thinking  pleasant  thoughts  and 
you  will  wear,  as  a  habit,  a  smile.  Take  a  pleasant 
thought  to  bed  with  you  and  you  will  smile  all  the 
next  day. 

The  rain  falls  upon  the  newly  plowed  hill  and  makes 
a  little  streamlet  down  the  field.  The  next  shower 
fills  the  little  channel  and  cuts  it  deeper.  So  does 
the  next  and  the  next,  until  the  traveler  of  a  later  gen- 
eration than  the  plowman,  finds  a  deep  gutty  or  ravine. 
The  water  was  trained  to  a  habit  of  flowing  in  one 
place.  So  with  thought.  Thought  is  Power.  The 
same  thought  repeated  creates  brain  and  nerve  condi- 
tions, thus  like  the  rain-fall,  preparing  for  itself  a 


46  CONCENTRATION: 

physical  memory.  Application  of  this  principle  gives 
the  fingers  of  the  pianist  and  the  typist,  such  automatic 
power.  In  like  manner  every  thought  creates  the  nerve 
cells  through  which  to  express  itself. 
Fear,  worry,  anger  or  any  passion  becomes  a  mental 
habit  and  creates  for  its  expression  the  right  machine. 
Grey  matter  is  already  secreted  for  that  purpose  through 
previous  thoughts  of  fear,  and  worry. 
Each  time  an  Affirmation  is  made  there  are  nerve  cells 
created  that  make  it  easier  for  the  Affirmation  to  con- 
trol the  body  the  next  time.  And  the  next  time  the 
Affirmation  is  made,  a  thrill  passes  through  the  whole 
system,  as  the  prepared  cells  respond  to  the  thought. 
Thus  through  Affirmation,  after  a  little  while,  we  have 
a  new  mental  habit,  with  a  new  physical  memory  writ- 
ten in  our  nervous  system,  through  which  that  habit 
finds  easy  expression.  The  sympathetic  nerve  is  like 
my  father's  old  horse.  Father  rode  around  the  country 
buying  produce,  and  the  old  horse  would  stop  at  every 
farm-house  where  he  had  been  accustomed  to  stop,  no 
matter  whether  we  were  on  a  purchasing  tour  or  a 
picnic.  It  is  necessary  that  we  guard  our  thoughts, 
and  especially  our  words,  for  the  vibrations  of  our  voice 
create  nerve  conditions  through  which  the  thought  will 
work  automatically,  like  the  old  horse. 
Have  you  never  had  a  tune  ring  in  your  head  all  night, 
or  some  song,  or  word  of  friend?  The  listening  had 
made  a  nerve-condition  that  keeps  up  automatic  action. 
Much  of  fear  and  worry  continues  in  this  way.  Stop  it 
by  will. 

Understanding  that  nerve  cells  vibrate  from  habit  with- 
out our  conscious  thouglit,  it  behoves  us  to  be  careful 
of  the  thought  habits  we  form;  to  be  careful  of  what 


—THE  ROAD  TO  SUCCESS.  47 

thoughts  we  express;  careful  of  what  thoughts  we  hold 
but  do  not  express,  for  the  silent  holding,  creates  also 
nerve-conditions  that  later  compel  expression.  From 
unpleasant  thoughts,  people  so  create  their  bodies,  that 
they  find  it  impossible  to  live  in  them,  and  move  out 
through  disease. 

Out  of  the  chasm  of  a  bad  mental  habit,  we  can  build 
the  ladder  on  which  to  climb,  only  of  pleasant  thoughts. 
Each  time  the  Affirmation  is  made,  a  lung  is  placed 
in  the  ladder.  Repetition  will  create  the  habit  of  con- 
centration, so  that  soon  nerves  will  readily  respond,  and 
the  habit  of  health  and  happiness  be  formed. 
Whoever  says  to  me,  "I  can^t  concentrate !''  is  simply 
repeating  the  cry  of  an  old  habit.  I  reply,  "You  can, 
but  you  don't!  When  you  will  to,  you  will  concen- 
trate.^'  The  habit  of  willing  soon  becomes  a  pleasure; 
becomes  chronic.  You  learn  that  you  can,  when  you 
thi7ilc  you  can.  Concentration  depends  upon  the  habit 
you  create.  Therefore,  to  tell  me  you  cannot,  is  to  make 
conditions  so  that  you  do  not. 

If  you  really  v^ish  to  concentrate;  wish  to  enjoy  the 
Silence,  you  must  make  it  a  habit  to  do  so,  by  giving 
thought,  will,  effort  and  love  to  it,  till  it  becomes  as 
natural  to  concentrate  then,  as  now  to  fear.  You 
know  how  habits  of  any  kind  are  formed.  Do  with  a 
chosen  Affirmation  as  you  have  been  doing  with  Affirm- 
ations of  fear,  worry,  and  illness,  and  soon  you  will  find 
yourself  living  in  the  Silence;  for  the  habit  of  concen- 
tration, of  paying  attention,  to  a  chosen  thought,  will 
have  been  formed.  This  habit  will  grow  upon  you  til\ 
you  realize  that  you  can  think  whatever  you  choose 
to  think.    And  be  whatever  you  choose  to  be. 


48  CONCENTRATION : 


SECTION  IX. 

"IN  THE  SILENCE/' 

The  Soul  contains  in  itself  the  event  that  shall  befall  it. 

— Goethe. 
You  are  in  "the  silence"  now.  The  only  way  to  realize 
it  is  to  get  still,  physically  and  mentally.  It  takes  time 
and  practice  to  do  it,  and  there  are  no  short  cuts  except 
as  aspiration,  faith  and  suggestion  help  to  quiet  your 
mental  chattering.  But  the  spiritual  and  mental  and 
material  rewards  of  such  practice  are  enormous.  Eye  hath 
not  seen  nor  ear  heard  the  glories  that  are  free  in  the 
silence. 

— Elizabeth  Toivne  in  ''Nautilus.'' 

In  the  silence  of  the  Spirit, 

In  the  higher  realms  above, 
In  the  deeper  life  within  me, 

In  the  world  of  perfect  love; 
I  have  found  my  Father's  kingdom 

And  His  righteousness  divine; 
I  have  sought  and  found  my  heaven. 

And  all  else  is  ever  mine. 

— C.  J.  Larsen. 
I  will  be  silent  in  my  Soul, 

Since  God  has  girt  me  round 
With  His  own  Silence  in  which 

There  is  no  space  for  sound. 
Only  His   voice  perchance  may   drop 

Like  dew  upon  the  ground. 

— Anna  Hempstead  Branch. 

Thus  far  I  have  dealt  directly  with  the  Philosophy  of 
Concentration;  now  I  shall  give  what  has  been  called 
out  by  pupils  and  patients.  If  some  thoughts  are  re- 
peated, it  is  because  I  feel  it  is  necessary  to  repeat  for 
power,  and  that  conclusions  be  reached  from  as  many 
points  of  view  as  possible.  My  notes  cover  answers 
to  many  questions  and  each  reader  will  find  here,  I 
trust,  answers  to  those  he  is  asking. 


—THE  ROAD  TO  SUCCESS.  49 

This  phrase,  ''In  the  Silence/^  so  much  in  use  does  not 
mean  any  peculiar  condition.  Often  it  is  expressed 
thus,  ''Going  into  the  Silence !"  There  is  no  "going." 
The  Soul  lives  in  Silence.  We  are  there  constantly. 
Silence  is  that  mental  attitude  which  shuts  out  the  ex- 
ternal world  through  lack  of  attention.  We  come  en- 
rapport  with  the  external  world  through  the  five  senses. 
Closing  these,  we  listen  to  that  which  we  hear  in  the 
silence  of  the  soul.  I  like  best  to  use  the  phrase,  "List- 
ening to  the  Silence." 

The  noise  and  turmoil  of  the  objective,  which  is  the 
physical  life,  never  reaches  the  Soul.  The  Eeal  Man — 
the  Soul — is  never  disturbed.  It  is  the  conscious  part 
of  our  Being  that  is  disturbed;  made  unquiet;  taken 
out  of  ease  and  placed  in  that  condition  we  term  dis- 
ease. The  Soul  is  like  God,  always  at  rest;  always  at 
peace;  always  silent.  The  Self- Consciousness  of  Man 
alone  knows  worry,  fret,  pain,  trouble,  disease,  and 
death.  The  Soul  never  dies;  no  more  can  it  suffer  any 
inharmony.  These  conditions  of  un-rest  are  merely 
disturbances  in  the  manifestation,  and  not  in  that 
Eeality  which  manifests.  The  man  who  runs  a  machine 
may  be  quiet  and  peaceful,  yet  the  machine  may  run 
with  racket  and  in  disorder.  So  with  the  Soul;  all 
the  disorder  is  in  the  mental  part  of  our  Being  and  is 
but  the  necessary  education  for  our  unf oldment.  We 
shall  ultimately  reach  that  serene  condition,  "Wliere 
we  neither  wish  nor  will ;"  where  we  shall,  in  the  words 
j  of  Emerson,  "Trust  the  current  that  knows  its  way." 
j;  These  disturbed  conditions  are  but  the  preparation  the 
1  ignorant  man  makes  for  that  later  condition  of  spiritual 
maturity,  where  in  Faith  and  Trust  he  "Lets  the  light 


50  CONCENTRATION: 

shine  f  the  "Light  that  lighteth  every  man  that  cometh 
into  the  world."  The  Intelligence  that  is  latent  in  the 
Soul;  the  Power  of  the  God-in-man  is  awakening  into 
Conscious  expression.  When  there  is  sufficient  unfold- 
nient  conditions  of  inharmony  pass  away  and  there  is 
At-one-ment ;  our  will  is  one  with  the  Absolute,  the 
Universal  Will.  In  this  condition,  one  is  led  as  the 
Quaker  and  all  saintly  persons  are,  by  the  Inner  Voice. 
Whittier  says  of  that  time  when  mankind  shall  recog- 
nize this  Inner  Voice,  that  above  the  harsh  and  dis- 
cordant noises  of  the  present, 

A  sweeter  song  shall  then  be  heard, 
The  music  of  the  world's  accord, 
Confessing  Christ,  the  Inward  word! 
That  song  shall  swell  from  shore  to  shore, 
One  Hope,  one  Faith,  one  Love,  restore 
The  seamless  robe  that  Jesus  wore. 

This  same  poet  also  makes  this  excellent  prayer  for 
us  all: — 

Cease  not  Voice  of  holy  speaking, 
Teacher  sent  of  God,  be  near, 
Whispering  through  the  day's  cool  silence, 
Let  my  spirit  hear. 

The  Hindoo,  the  priest,  the  seer,  the  poet,  the  inventor, 
all  have  learned  to  listen  in  the  Silence  and  what  is 
there  spoken  they  proclaim.  In  this  knowledge  of  the 
Silence  we  are  only  making  common  property  of  the 
ancient  secret  of  Concentration,  meditation  and  prayer, 
which  has  ever  been  the  methods  of  psychic  unfoldment. 
An  ancient  occult  saying  is  "Silence  is  Power !"  Silence 
is  the  condition  in  which  all  power  exists,  and  in  which 
all  power  operates.  Power  is  silent.  The  Hebrews 
spoke  of  God  as  dwelling  in  Silence.  No  one  hears 
the  rustle  of  the  robes  of  Gravity  as  it  draws  earth  and 
sun  into  equilibrium.    There  is  no  noise  as  the  sun  each 


—THE  ROAD  TO  SUCCESS.  51 

day  lifts  billions  of  tons  of  water.  Electricity  makes  no 
sound  as  it  ceaselessly  works  amid  the  spheres.  "When 
the  morning  stars  sang  together  and  all  the  sons  of  God 
shouted  for  joy,"  the  objective  world  was  silent;  only 
the  ear  that  hears  in  the  silence  heard  the  song  of  joy. 
The  Trappist  monks  have  this  saying — "It  is  silence 
that  shuts  out  new  ideas,  worldly  topics  and  controversy. 
It  is  silence  that  enables  the  soul  to  contemplate  with 
singleness  and  mortification  the  infinite  perfections  of 
the  Eternal!" 

During  my  youth  I  learned  this  extract  which  has  been 

an  inspiration  to  me.    I  know  not  the  author. 

"In  silence  mighty  tilings  are  wrought — 
Silently  builded,  thought  on  thought. 

Truth's  temple  greets  the  sky; 
And  like  a  citadel  with  towers 
The  Soul  with  her  subservient  powers 

Is  strengthened  silently." 

The  Bible  contains  many  passages  upon  the  power  of 
silence  and  none  more  valuable  than  the  admonition  of 
Jesus  to  "Enter  the  closet,"  which  I  interpret,  from 
my  experience,  to  mean,  "Close  the  external  senses  and 
listen  to  the  Silence  and  what  you  hear  there  you  shall 
manifest  in  your  life."  All  the  possibility  of  Demon- 
stration in  all  lines  of  mental  science  must  lie  in  the 
unfoldment  that  comes  through  meditation — Silence. 
The  Hindoo  mystic  does  this  when  he  sits  under  the 
Bo-tree  and  hears  nothing.  Concentration  in  Silence 
is  the  only  road  to  inspiration,  in  any  of  its  forms  of 
Life,  Love,  Ttuth  and  Power. 

The  Power  of  Silence  and  the  Power  m  silence  are  the 
most  important  lessons  the  present  century  has  to  learn. 
Prof.  William  Crooks  estimates  that  "a  cubic  foot  of 


52  CONCENTRATION : 

ether  which  fills  all  space  has  locked  up  within  it 
10^000  cubic-foot  tons  of  energy  which  have  as  yet 
escaped  notice.  To  unlock  this  boundless  store  and  sub- 
due it  to  the  service  of  man  is  the  task  that  awaits  the 
scientist  of  the  future.  The  later  researches  give  well 
founded  hopes  that  this  store  house  of  power  is  not 
hopelessly  inaccessible!"  Thus  reasons  the  physicist; 
but  the  power  he  sees  is  both  in,  and  of,  the  Silence. 
All  these  foot-tons,  and  all  the  varieties  of  power  the 
scientist  knows,  do  not  exhaust  the  possibilities  of  God 
as  Power.  Science  is  but  bringing  the  old  conception 
of  God  into  more  intelligible  terms. 
The  physical  scientist  is  not  the  one  who  reveals  God 
as  power.  The  metaphysician  does  this,  and  harnesses 
this  power  to  human  Ego  as  Will.  Prentice  Mulford, 
an  early  New  Thought  teacher,  said: — 

The  source  of  all  strength  of  muscle  is  in  your  mind.  Your 
amount  of  physical  strength  depends  upon  your  capacity 
to  call  force  to  act  upon  whatever  part  of  the  body  you 
choose.    Forever,  Spirit,  Thought,  means  for  us  the  same! 

But  all  action  of  Mind  is  in  silence.  Not  till  thought 
finds  objective  expression  is  there  any  sound.  Through 
Mind  we  are  in  touch  with  the  Omnipotence  working 
in  silence.  Through  this  union  man  possesses  all,  be- 
cause he  is  but  a  manifestation  of  All,  and  the  All  is 
indivisible.  In  Silence  man  can  learn  how  to  use, 
through  his  intellect,  the  All  of  which  he  is  but  the 
conscious  manifestation,  directing  this  sub-conscious 
manifestation  in  his  life.  Considering  that  we  have 
all  of  God  for  a  reservoir,  we  can  well  ask  the  question 
with  John  White  Chadwick: — 

"Where  such  a  wealth  of  perfect  things 
How  dare  we  ask  for  more." 


—THE  ROAD  TO  SUCCESS.  53 

Carlyle  understood  the  value  of  Silence  when  he  wrote 
to  Emerson: — "Silence  is  the  greatest  thing  I  worship 
at  present ;  almost  sole  tenant  of  my  Pantheon !  Let 
a  man  know  rightly  to  hold  his  peace.  I  love  to  repeat 
to  myself^  'Silence  is  of  Eternity  V  " 
To  attain  the  power  to  listen  at  any  time,  and  at  all 
times,  to  the  Silence,  is  to  have  unraveled  the  secret 
of  the  Sphynx.  In  her.  Silence  is  deified  and  made 
vocal.  All  who  have  learned  the  secret  of  living  through 
Concentration,  have  lifted  the  "Veil  of  Isis  V  I  recom- 
mend you  to  memorize  this  little  poem  of  mine  that 
it  may  lead  you  to  Life,  through  Meditation. 
UNITY. 

I  stood  by  Sphynx  in  desert  lone. 

Impassive    and    cold    her   face   of   stone; 

Stolid   and  dull  those   ancient  eyes; 

Her  lips  refused  me  any  tone; 

Her  ears  were  deaf  as  stone  on   shore; 

Heart  still  as  in  eons  before. 

In  awe  I  bowed  to  material  guise, 

Nor  deemed  for  me  the  great  surprise, 

To  greet  me  from  those  stony  eyes. 

Musing,  I  said,  "All  are  divine! 

Kin  art  thou  to  this  Life  of  mine! 

We're  children  both  of  the  Infinite  One!" 

Then  vocal  became  those  lips  of  stone; 

Her  ear  had  caught  my  gentlest  tone; 

From  eyes  a  flame  of  Love-light  shone; 

Heart  beat  as  once  to  priest  of  yore! 

I  was  lone  ho  more  on  desert  sand — 

A  companion  held  my  hand. 

I'd  solved  the  riddle  of  all  time — 

The  SOUL  of  Sphynx  was  one  with  mine. 


54  CONCENTRATION: 


SECTION  X. 


COMPEISrSATION   OF  COISrCENTIlATION'. 

Though  no  human  eye  behold  thee 
Odin  sees  and  hears  each  word. 

— Fridthjorfs  Saga. 

Hush!  the  sevenfold  heavens  to  the  voice  of  the  Spirit 
Echo: — He  that  o'er  cometh  all  things  shall  inherit. 

— Owen  Merideth. 

You  laugh  at  monotones,  at  men  of  one  idea,  but  if  we 
look  at  nearly  all  heroes  we  may  find  the  same  poverty; 
and  perhaps  it  is  not  poverty  but  power.  The  secret  of 
power,  intellectual  or  physical,  is  concentration,  and  all 
concentration  involves  of  necessity  a  certain  narrowness. — 
If  you  ask  what  compensation  is  made  for  the  inevitable 
narrowness,  why,  this,  that  in  learning  one  thing  well  you 
learn  all  things. 

— Emerson. 

"How  shall  I  concentrate  ?"  "I  can't  concentrate.  Will 
you  help  me?''  "Please  tell  me  how  to  concentrate!" 
"I  have  been  a  student  of  the  New  Thought  for  years 
but  have  not  mastered  concentration.  Will  you  give 
me  directions?"  These  and  many  more  questions  are 
among  the  letters  on  my  desk.  Yes.  I  will  help  you 
all  by  as  simple  illustrations  as  possible.  But  I  have 
already  said  that  you  all  do  concentrate,  though  upon 
wrong  thoughts. 

Every  art  is  the  common  property  of  mankind.     No 
faculty  can  be  created.     No  new  power  is  ever  manu- 
factured.    If  what  you  desire  really  exists,  then  you 
possess  it  in  common  with  all  persons. 
The  chances  are  that  you  have  held  in  connection  with 


—THE  ROAD  TO  SUCCESS.  55 

your  desire,  some  thought  of  the  mysterious,  or  the 
supernatural.  If  Concentration  is  "the  secret  of 
power/^  then  wherever  you  find  power  it  must  be  the 
result  of  concentration.  Man  uses  power.  You  in  your 
Life  are  Power.  Did  you  not  concentrate  you  were 
i^owei-less  and  to  the  extent  that  you  have  voluntarily 
exercised  power,  you  have  to  that  degree  concentrated. 
So  much  power  in  manifestation,  so  much  concen+i;a- 
tion. 

The  motto  for  Concentration  is,  "One  thing  at  a  time !" 
Concentration  is  only  paying  attention.  How  man}^ 
times  did  we  as  children  hear  parent  or  teacher  say 
when  our  mind  was  wandering — "Pay  attention  V  The 
cat  watching  at  the  hole  for  the  mouse  and  the  pointer 
dog  on  scent,  are  types  of  concentration.  Follow  t\? 
ture^s  evolution  from  cat  and  dog  to  Newton  and  Dar- 
win and  you  find  that  Success  is  but  materialized  at- 
tention. Newton  expressed  it  as — "Intending  the 
mindr 

A  person  naturally  concentrates.  The  mind  develops 
through  concentration.  The  child  concentrates  b'lt  he 
can  hold  himself  to  one  thought  but  a  few  moments. 
Upon  this  fact  the  kindergarten  teacher  instructs. 
Changes  are  frequent  in  the  school  day  of  her  pupils. 
Parents  forget  this  inability  of  immatuie  minds  and 
set  too  hard  tasks  for  children;  demand  too  much  of 
them  and  then  complain  that  they  are  not  quiet,  are 
restless,  fretful,  fickle;  that  they  are  inattentive  and 
forgetful.  All  this  is  true.  The  wise  parent' would 
not  have  it  otherwise  lest  the  child  have  no  childhood, 
and  be  old  before  his  time.  Wisdom  recognizes  this 
native  condition  and  takes  advantage  of  it  by  not  over- 


56  CONCENTRATION: 

taxing  the  child.  As  the  powers  of  mind  unfold,  this 
power  of  concentration  should  increase,  but  the  chances 
are  one  hundred  to  one  that  it  is  lessened  by  false  train- 
ing. The  child  concentrates  at  play.  Every  boy  con- 
centrates at  his  games.  Watch  how  every  muscle  is 
tense  and  every  faculty  alert  in  the  game  of  ball ;  when 
he  is  on  his  skates;  or  when  sliding;  or  when  riding 
on  his  bicycle.  How  still — concentrated — is  even  the 
baby  when  he  is  "in  mischief,"  which  to  him  is  as 
much  business  as  is  the  bank,  or  shop  to  his  father. 
Concentration  is  the  one  method  of  accomplishment, 
and  the  power  to  concentrate  at  will,  is  the  sign  of 
mature  mind.  The  masses  of  people  still  have  child 
minds.  They  have  little  power  to  hold  to  a  thought 
and  thus  wander  in  conversation;  change  constantly 
the  premise  in  argument  and  lack  logical  acumen.  The 
scientist  has  power  over  his  mind;  the  pseudo-scientist 
reaches  conclusions  that  are  false  because  he  lacks  this 
power  of  concentration  and  cannot  hold  to  all  the  facts 
till  the  result  is  truth. 

The  need  of  present  humanity  is  revealed  in  this  lack 
of  power  to  concentrate  upon  chosen  and  desired 
thoughts.  Few  have  the  power  to  concentrate  at  will. 
The  great  majority  are  led  through  involuntary  con- 
centration to  illness,  failure  and  misery.  They  let 
thoughts  pick  them  up,  instead  of  picking  up  the 
thought  they  wish.  They  are  children  in  man's  guise 
and  estate.  Therefore  when  you  tell  me  you  can't,  or 
don't,  concentrate  you  are  merely  telling  me  that  you 
are  in  mental  babyhood;  are  not  self-directed;  but  are 
the  creature  of  any  thought  that  circumstance  happens 
to  throw  in  your  path.    For  this  reason  it  is  expected 


—THE  ROAD  TO  SUCCESS.  57 

that  beginners  in  Soul  Culture  will  find  difficulty  in 
voluntary  concentration.  Every  New  Thought  cult 
is  but  a  method  of  bringing  the  individual  into  more 
perfect  expression  of  his  power  of  self-control.  And 
the  manifestation  of  this  control  lies  in  the  power  to 
choose,  and  to  hold,  the  chosen  thought. 
Present  conditions  of  mental  chaos,  weakness,  fickleness, 
sensationalism,  wandering  and  unsettled  physical  con- 
ditions are  the  result  of  a  false  home,  school  and  social 
education.  Too  much  is  attempted;  too  many  things 
m^erely  skimmed ;  too  much  superficial  attention  given  to 
too  many  studies.  ^*Beware  of  the  man  of  one  book^^  is 
a  wise  proverb.  Too  much  compulsion  is  put  upon 
children.  They  are  driven  by  force,  or  through  com- 
petition, as  in  prizes,  at  school  and  Christmas  trees, 
by  hopes  of  promotion,  and  in  college  by  degrees.  The 
motive  is  ignoble,  selfish,  diffusive.  The  child  is  not 
drawn  by  the  love  of  a  noble  ideal.  What  is  done  by 
compulsion  weakens  character.  What  is  done  through 
love  strengthens  it.  The  child  to  become  educated 
should  LOVE  his  school,  his  teachers.  He  will  then  go, 
drawn  by  his  ideal.  He  should  love  to  read,  to  study. 
The  whole  duty  of  parents  and  teachers  is  to  create 
this  love,  to  inspire  this  love  of  growth,  in  the  child. 
There  is  no  lack  of  attention  where  there  is  love,  no 
diffusion  then  over  many  things.  It  is  the  one  loved 
thing.  Notice  the  child  at  play;  the  man  at  congenial 
task;  the  man  in  love  with  his  mistress.  Where  this 
love  is  not,  then  through  effort,  under  necessity,  a  habit 
of  concentration  is  formed  for  some  particular  thing; 
and  the  man  becomes  a  machine.  There  is  an  equally 
weak  condition  of  character  as  balance. 


58 

One  of  the  best  bookkeepers  I  ever  knew  was  so  perfectly 
concentrated  while  at  his  work  that  nothing  ever  dis- 
turbed him;  but  he  was  one  of  the  most  fretful  and 
nervous  of  men  at  home  and  in  society.  A  merchant  of 
my  acquaintance,  most  genial  and  concentrated  upon 
business  in  his  store,  was  cross  and  fickle  at  home.  A 
professor  among  my  friends,  is  completely  self-posess- 
ed  and  absorbed  in  his  study  and  class,  but  is  a  most 
timid  and  nervous  man  elsewhere.  I  have  a  friend  so 
concentrated  in  his  base-ball  game  that  he  knows  no 
pain  when  injured,  but  possesses  so  little  indurance  at 
other  times  that  a  cut  on  his  finger  while  at  his  work 
unnerves  him.  I  knew  a  surgeon  most  cool  and  impas- 
sive when  at  the  operating  table,  that  would  walk  the 
floor  all  night  before  an  important  operation.  I  know  of 
actors  so  concentrated  upon  their  part  that  they  do  not 
remember  anything  that  has  transpired  during  the  play, 
but  who  are  so  nervous  at  other  times  that  they  break 
down  in  insomnia.  I  had  a  friend,  a  most  successful 
orator,  so  concentrated  when  talking  that  he  would 
not  sense  his  body,  who  was  in  his  home  and  oflBce  the 
most  restless  and  sensitive  of  men.  I  know  a  woman 
who  is  so  fretful  and  fickle  with  her  cliildren  that  she 
spoils  them,  but  who  will  play  croquet  with  perfect 
abandon,  forgetting  everything. 

This  is  the  case  with  many  gamesters  at  cards,  and 
habitues  of  race-courses.  These  are  all  examples  of 
concentration  under  necessity  or  habit.  This  condition 
is  a  dangerous  one  for  health  and  happiness,  because 
uncontrolled.  All  excitement  is  concentration,  where 
the  person  has  completely  lost  self-control.  For  this 
reason  Emerson  says,  "When  you  become  interested  in 


Or 

—THE  ROAD  TO  SUCCESS  "^^^^itSSi^ 

a  book  put  it  away."  Proper  development  gives  one  at 
all  times,  the  power  to  concentrate  in  any  chosen  line 
and  at  the  same  time  keep  self-control. 
Understand  me,  it  is  not  that  condition  where  we  call 
a  person  cold  and  unsocial.  That  is  not  concentration, 
but  constraint,  repression,  and  is  equally  dangerous  to 
health.  Self-possession  is  very  different  from  self-re- 
pression. This  latter  is  common  to  find  and  is  the  result 
of  a  fashionable  education  and  of  social  etiquette.  Be- 
cause of  repression  doctors  and  undertakers  are  reaping 
a  rich  harvest.  "Except  ye  become  as  little  children  V 
is  the  true  thought  of  concentration.  The  only  natural 
concentration  is  under  desire;  is  in  the  line  we  love. 
The  only  proper  way  to  concentrate  is  at  will,  and  not 
because  we  have  to.  Let  there  be  no  "Have  to!"  in 
your  life,  would  you  be  self -centered  and  self-directed. 
A  friend  often  replies  when  asked  why  he  does  not  do 
a  certain  thing, — "I  don't  have  to !"  An  industrial  and 
social  condition  that  compels  a  man  to  do  that  which 
he  does  not  love,  and  which  civilization  has  not  taught 
him  to  love,  which  has  not  inspired  him  with  an  ideal 
that  lifts  him  above  the  thought  of  necessity  or  starva- 
tion ;  is  not  entitled  to  the  name  of  civilization.  It  needs 
Edward  Carpenter's  book  used  upon  it  as  a  surgeon. 
He  entitled  his  book — "Civilization,  its  Cause  and 
Cure !"  Present  civilization  needs  to  be  cured.  The 
prophet's  cry  is  applicable  to  the  present  condition. 
"These  people  honor  me  with  their  lips,  but  their  hearts 
are  far  from  me !" 

Heartlessness  must  be  the  case  where  necessity  rules. 
Never  a  child  loved  its  parent  because  it  was  driven 
to.     No  husband  ever  loved  his  wife  because  she  de- 


60  CONCENTRATION: 

manded,  "I  am  yours  and  you  shall  love  me!"  This 
demand  kills  what  love  there  was  in  the  marriage.  As 
water  flows  down  hill,  so,  naturally,  do  we  concentrate 
upon  that  which  we  love. 

The  first  thing  to  do  as  one  comes  into  this  New- 
Thought-life,  is  to  do  what  he  loves — or  love  what  he 
does.  He  must  abolish  the  thought  of  must,  of  neces- 
sity. Any  method  of  concentration  is  lost  upon  one 
who  will  not  cultivate  a  love  for  present  conditions  and 
let  that  love  lead  him  out  of  unpleasant  ones.  Because 
every  thought  of  antagonism  is  a  concentration  born 
of  weakness  and  of  unhappiness,  learn  to  love  present 
conditions  and  you  will  naturally  concentrate  upon  the 
right  thought.  Learn  to  love  the  Affirmations  that 
lead  you  out  to  health  and  happiness  and  you  will  nat- 
urally concentrate  upon  them.  Learn  to  love  your 
neighbor  as  you  love  yourself  and  you  will  concentrate 
upon  thoughts  of  helpfulness.  Love  that  which  you  are 
trying  to  do  and  your  love  will  lead  you  through  con- 
centration to  BE  that  which  you  desire. 


—THE  ROAD  TO  SUCCESS.  61 


SECTION  XL 


WITH  EYES,  SEE  NOT. 

Let  us  aspire  to  that  heaven  where  all  is  eternal  and 
where  corruption  never  comes. 

— Ancient  Aztec  King. 

I  speak  to  them  in  parables  because  having  eyes  they  see 
not  and  having  ears  they  hear  not,  *  *  *  *  Their  ears 
are  dull  of  hearing  and  their  eyes  they  have  closed,  lest 
at  any  time  they  shall  hear  with  their  ears  and  shall  see 
I  with  their  eyes  and  should  understand  with  their  hearts! 

— Jesus. 

These  words  reported  of  Jesus  have  been  shortened  into 
the  proverb,  "None  so  blind  as  those  who  will  not  see; 
and  none  so  deaf  as  those  who  will  not  hear!"  This 
fact  is  a  common  one.  A  person  does  not  see  or  hear 
that  to  which  he  gives  no  attention.  But  within  this 
fact  lies  the  deeper  fact,  that  one  does  not  see  and  hear, 
because  one  wills  not  to  see  and  hear.  That  is,  each 
person  has  the  power  of  choice  and  may  see  and  nmy 
hear  that  which  he  chooses,  and  may  not  hear  and  may 
Qot  see  that  which  he  does  not  choose  to  hear  and  to  see. 
To  exercise  this  choice  is  to  be  the  master  of  fate.  This 
choice  is  the  prerogative  of  humanity  alone.  It  is  the 
patent- right  of  manhood;  the  entail  of  God's  heritage 
to  Man.  To  the  degree  in  which  we  exercise  this  choice 
we  have  outgrown  the  animal  in  us ;  have  made  it  sub- 
ervient  to  the  Human. 

To  see  is  to  pay  attention  to.  To  hear  is  to  listen  to. 
To  understand  with  the  heart,  is  to  so  concentrate  upon 


62  CONCENTRATION: 

what  is  about  you,  to  so  think  upon  what  is  heard,  seen 
and  felt,  that  you  shall  know  the  meaning  it  has  in 
your  life. 

Concentration  is  the  simplest  thing  to  understand  when 
you  realize  that  it  is  thinking  upon  that  which  you 
do;*paying  attention  to  what  is  about  you.  It  is  a  habit 
that  can  be  acquired,  but  one  so  often  neglected  in 
childhood.  It  is  the  fault  of  teachers  and  parents  that 
children  do  not  grow  up  conscious  of  their  power  to 
choose  and  hold  to  the  thought  chosen.  Wandering 
minds  are  formed  from  uncongenial  tasks. 
Study  the  children  at  any  school  and  see  how  uncon- 
genial are  the  tasks  to  many  of  them.  It  is  a  common 
thing  to  see  children  pretending  or  trying  to  study, 
but  often  glancing  from  the  book,  watching  what  is 
going  on.  This  cultivates  insincerity,  pretence,  hypo- 
crisy, affectation,  fickleness;  all  of  which  arises  from  a 
lack  of  attention. 

Concentration  means  that  we  shall  be  absorbed  in  the 
task  of  the  hour.  The  biographer  of  Agassiz  tells  us  i 
that  he  would  bring  his  work  into  the  parlor  of  an 
evening  when  it  v^as  filled  with  young  company  and 
devote  a  portion  of  the  time  to  social  converse  and  en- 
joyment and  at  the  next  moment  turn  with  complete 
abandon  to  his  study,  oblivious  of  those  about  him.  In 
this  he  showed  complete  control  of  his  mind, — of  him- 
self. Tennyson  tells  a  friend  in  a  letter,  that  he  prac- 
ticed concentration  before  his  literary  labors  by  center- 
ing his  mind  upon  his  own  name;  then  allowed  no  in- 
terruption. 

To  affirm  that  you  can't  concentrate  is  to  affirm  lark  of 
faith  in  yourself,  for  the  first  necessity  of  success  and 


—THE  ROAD  TO  SUCCESS.  63 

happiness  is  faith  in  your  possibilities.     Where  this 
faith  is  not,  there  is  very  little  accomplished  in  the  way 
of   character-building.     Therefore   the   first   step   you 
need  to  take  is  to  cultivate  this  faith  in  yoursslf .    Prac- 
tice affirming  the  infinite  possibilities  of  the  Human 
Soul.  Think  of  yourself  as  an  incarnation  of  God  with  all 
the  possibilities  of  the  God-head  in  you.    Meditate  upon 
the  words  of  Jesus,  ^The  kingdom  of  God  is  within 
I  you!"  till  you  feel  able  to  accomplish  anything  you 
desire.     This    meditation    is    concentration.     As  you 
I  meditate  upon  this  thought  you   will  grow  into   the 
!  power  of  expression.     Affirm — "I,  as  spirit  (or  mind) 
'  possess  all  power  I  need  to  accomplish  my  desires." 
I  The  thought  of  "Can^t"  is  born  in  recognition  of  the 
power  of  circumstances.     As  long  as  you  think  they 
have  power  you  give  them  power.     Circumstances  in 
themselves  have  no  power  for  either  good  or  evil.    The 
thought  you  have  of  them  determines  their  effect  upon 
yourself.     If  you  fear  them,  you  give  them  power  to 
harm,  that  is,  you  are  harmed  by  the  thought  you  put 
into  them.  You  may  think  whatever  you  choose  of  any 
circumstance  or  condition,  and  it  becomes  to  you  that 
which  you  think  it  is.    Let  me  take  a  simple  illustra- 
tion.   When  I  was  a  boy  we  planned  a  picnic  one  sum- 
mer.    The  morning  arose  rainy.     I  felt  so  badly  over 
it  as  an  evil,  that  I  cried,  but  others  of  the  family 
rejoiced,  for  a  drought  was  broken.    They  were  happy, 
but  I  went  to  bed  with  a  sick  headache.    The  fact  was, 
but  a  rainy  day,  and  it  became  to  each  one  that  which 
his  thought  made  it.    Fire,  defeat,  loss  of  property  are 
mere  circumstances;   one,   by  them,  is  stimulated  to 
I  greater  effort,  another  is  crushed  into  lethargy.     Con- 


64  CONCENTRATION: 

eentration  in  the  fear  of  things  and  of  conditions, 
creates  anxiety,  worry  and  defeat.  Concentration  in 
Faith  in  the  All  Good,  upon  things  and  conditions, 
causes  cheer,  clearness  of  vision  and  success. 
How  you  shall  consider  any  circumstance,  is  for  you 
to  decide  and  as  you  decide,  that  circumstance  is  to 
you. 

But  having  made  your  decision,  stick  to  it.  Concen- 
trate upon  the  thought  w^hich  you  have  decided  as 
the  right  one  to  hold  in  relation  to  that  circumstance. 
Through  this  concentration  you  will  make  your  de- 
cision a  fact  in  the  objective  life,  because  by  your  de- 
cision you  have  already  made  it  a  fact  in  the  Cause- 
Life. 

I  wish  to  emphasize  this  fact  because  it  is  most  im- 
portant. You  need  not  see  or  hear,  need  not  feel  or 
recognize,  anything  you  do  not  desire  to  sense.  You 
can  make  any  circumstance  bear  to  your  objective  life, 
whatever  relation  you  desire,  by  deciding  in  your  mind 
what  that  relation  shall  be,  and  by  then  concentrating 
upon  that  decision.  Wliy  do  I  affirm  this  ?  Because  I 
am  doing  it  every  day,  and  because  I  know  others  who 
are  doing  it.  What  one  person  does,  all  can  and  may  do. 
This  fact  was  impressed  upon  me  years  ago  by  the 
experiments  in  Suggestion.  As  soon  as  you  become  con- 
vinced that  the  position  I  take  in  my  little  book,  "Not 
Hypnotism  but  Suggestion,"  is  correct,  and  it  is  the 
position  of  all  expert  practitioners  of  the  Art,  you  will 
understand,  that  by  thinking  a  coin  is  hot,  when  held 
in  the  hand,  the  thought  will  produce  a  blister.  By 
thinking  a  drop  of  water  is  a  drop  of  Croton  oil,  a 
blister  is  formed;  by  thinking  a  door  knob  is  the  pole 


—THE  ROAD  TO  SUCCESS.  65 

of  an  electric  battery,  a  shock  is  received;  by  thinking 
a  handkerchief  is  perfumed,  an  odor  is  perceived,  and 
by  thinking  a  bread-pill  is  medicine,  one  is  cured.  From 
these  facts  you  can  draw  only  one  conclusion: — All 
have  like  effect  upon  the  body  and  environment. 
To  hold  a  candle  before  a  mirror  is  to  cause  a 
reflection  in  the  mirror;  in  like  manner  to  hold 
a  mental  picture  is  to  cause  its  reflection  in  the 
body.  To  change  that  picture  every  moment  is  to 
cause  a  change  in  the  bodily  reflection.  To  hold  a 
picture  continually  in  the  mind  is  to  keep  its  reflection 
constantly  in  the  body.  This  Concentration  does: — 
it  holds  the  candle  of  desire  before  the  mirror  of  flesh 
until  the  flesh  reflects  permanently  that  picture.  Con- 
centration carves  in  the  marble  of  the  material,  the 
model  held  by  Imagination,  the  creator,  who  builds 
through  thought.  From  this  fact  is  reached  the  con- 
clusion which  I  state  in  these  Affirmations — I  am  hlind 
and  deaf  to  all  that  is  unpleasant,  ill,  painful,  weak,  or 
that  carries  failure.  I  recognize  only  that  which  I 
wish  to  recognize.  I  pay  attention  only  to  chosen  ideas. 
I  see  only  that  which  I  wish  to  see.  I  hear  only  that 
which  I  wish  to  hear. 

You  can  gain  this  power  by  deciding  and  training  your- 
self as  Will  by  practice.  Practice  lies  in  the  use  of 
Affirmation.  Concentration  is  the  incubating  process 
which  brings  the  seed  thoughts  into  physical  expression. 
See  that  you  place  in  the  incubator  only  those  thoughts 
which  you  wish  to  run  about  in  the  garden  of  your 
life.  "None  so  blind  as  those  who  will  not  to  see.'* 
Be  thus  blind  through  will  and  you  will  open  your  eyes 
to  see  only  the  Good,  the  Beautiful  and  the  True. 


66  CONCICNTRATION: 


SECTION  XII. 


THE  IDEAL. 

Among  thy  sons  O  God!   let  me  be  one. 

—Edward  Egleston. 

To  live  divinely  is  man's  work. 

— Theodore  Parker. 

The  thing  we  long  for  that  we  are 

For  one  transcendent  moment, 
E'er  yet  the  present  poor  and  bare 

Can  make  its  sneering  comment. 
Still   through  our   paltry   stir   and   strife, 

Glows  the  wished  Ideal, 
And  Longing  moulds  in  clay,  what  Life 

Carves  in  the  marble  Real. 

— Lowell. 

I  have  suggested  in  previous  sections  that  it  is  the 
picture  in  the  mind  that  is  of  importance;  that  the 
Imagination  is  the  creative  power.  I  wish  now  to  in- 
tensify this  thought.  All  things  are  hut  material  re- 
flections of  mental  images.  You  realize  this  in  the 
statue  and  the  painting,  the  temple  and  the  machine. 
On  my  wall  hangs  a  most  beautiful  painting,  "The  Com- 
ing Light."  The  light  is  breaking  through  brilliant 
clouds,  "In  hues  that  envious  make  the  pearl-shell,  gem 
and  flower."  This  picture  is  but  a  faint  representation 
of  the  picture  that  was  in  the  Soul  of  the  painter.  He 
did  his  best  to  catch  it  with  canvas  and  brush.  Had 
it  not  existed  for  him  before  the  brush  was  in  his  hand, 
it  would  not  have  become  my  joy. 
There  stands  a  statue  in  yonder  museum  that  I  love 


—THE  ROAD  TO  SUOCESS.  67 

to  gaze  upon.  Story  saw  that  ''Greek  Slave"  long  be- 
fore he  took  marble  and  chisel;  but  when  the  Idea 
possessed  him  It  carved  itself.  A  mental  picture  then ; 
now  it  stands  a  marble  dream,  for  the  delight  of  man 
for  ages. 

Which  is  the  real  and  which  ideal  ?  Which  is  transitory 
and  which  is  permanent?  Which  is  Truth  and  which 
illusion?  Which  is  the  thing,  and  which  is  the  reflec- 
tion ?  Fire,  flood,  age,  neglect,  may  destroy  the  picture 
and  the  statue,  but  the  idea  cannot  be  destroyed.  The 
eternal  thing  is  the  Idea ;  the  transitory  is  its  reflection 
in  the  sense-material.  That  which  eternally  exists  is 
the  unseen  and  the  permanent ;  is  the  Ideal,  created  by 
the  Human  Mind  from  Divine  Ideas. 
I  wish  you  to  memorize  that  most  beautiful  extract  at 
beginning  of  this  section  from  Lowell.  It  is  scientific 
and  better  yet,  it  is  Truth.  And  Oliver  Wendell  Holmes 
has  something  only  a  little  less  perfect  which  is  also 
worth  remembering : 

Deal  gently  with  us,  ye  who  read! 

Our  largest  hope  is  unfulfilled — 
The  promise  still  outruns  the  deed — 

The  tower  but  not  the  spire  we  build. 
Our  whitest  pearls  we  never  find; 

Our  ripest  fruit  we  never  reach; 
The  flowering  moments  of  the  mind 

Drop  half  their  petals  in  our  speech. 
These  are  my  blossoms;  if  they  wear 

One  streak  of  mom  or  evening's  glow. 
Accept  them;  but  to  me  more  fair, 

The  buds  of  song  that  never  blow. 

This  is  but  repeating  in  Holmes'  beautiful  way,  the 
adage,  "Men  preach  better  than  they  practice!"  And 
this  is  the  most  important  fact  I  have  for  you  in  this 
lesson  in  Concentration.  No  progress  without  this 
Idealism.     No  practice  without  preaching  proceeds  it. 


68  CONCENTRATION: 

To  see  the  buds  mentally  is  to  create  them,  and  they 
will  bloom  not  only  in  the  eternal  realm  but  also  in  the 
objective  life.  They  lose  beauty  only  when  compared 
with  their  reflection  in  the  realm  of  decay  and  death. 
Dr.  Holmes  and  James  Eussell  Lowell  will  find  the 
greatest  joy  in  creating,  now  they  are  freed  from  this 
sense-limitation  of  expression.  The  creator — Mind — is 
superior  to  the  created — things — and  the  creation  is, 
that  the  creator  may  still  more  perfectly  create.  We 
are  now  devotees  to  appearances,  to  creations,  to  things, 
Emerson  tells  us : — 

Things  are  in  the  saddle 

And  ride  mankind. 

He  tells  us  also  that  this  "Law  for  Things,''  "Doth  man 
unking,"  and  adds: — 

And  what  if  Trade  sow  cities 

Like  shells  along  the  shore, 
And  thatch  with  towns  the  prairie  broad, 

With  railway  ironed  o'er? 
They  are  but  sailing  foam-bells 

Along  Thought's  causing  stream, 
And  take  their  shape  and  color, 

From  him  that  sends  the  dream. 

And  again  he  says  of  England's  abbeys  and  the  pyra- 
mids:— 

Out  of  Thought's  interior  sphere 
These  wonders  rose  to  upper  air. 

I  add  to  these  words  of  Emerson  these  other  words  from 

him,  prefacing  them  with  that  great  line  of  Eichard 

Realfs:— 

Vast  the  create  and  beheld,  but  vaster  the  inward  creator  I 

Emerson  looking  to  the  "Over-soul,"   says   of  human 

creations: 

These  wonders  grew  as  grows  the  grass, 

Art  might  obey  but  not  surpass. 

The  passive  Master  lent  his  hand 

To  the  vast  Soul  that  O'er  him  planned! 


—THE  ROAD  TO  SUCCESS.  69 

Mazzini,  the  Italian  patriot  and  statesman,  said  to  his 
countrymen : — 

Love  and  reverence  the  Ideal;  it  is  tlie  country  of  the 
Spirit;  the  city  of  the  Soul! 

In  no  other  country  can  the  Human  Mind  live.  The 
Imagination  is  the  "home  of  the  Soul."  No  happiness 
save  the  Ideal.  Hope  dwells  there  and  Peace  makes  the 
Ideal  her  habitation.  From  that  realm  come  all  the 
manifestations  of  Thought.  Man,  through  thought,  is 
creator.  His  workshop  is  the  unseen.  His  material, 
divine  ideas.  His  tool,  the  Imagination.  The  product. 
Ideals.  Amid  Ideals,  we  live.  They  are  our  only  com- 
panions. No  man  buys,  wears,  marries,  or  buries  aught 
but  his  Ideals.  He  lives  among  them  always  and  enjoys 
or  suffers  only  through  the  creations  of  his  mind.  Life, 
world,  men,  conditions,  the  hereafter  are  to  me  what 
I  think  them;  are  to  me  what  my  Ideals  of  them  are. 
It  is  important  that  you  realize  this,  for  your  health, 
happiness,  and  success  depend  upon  your  realization 
of  your  creative  power. 

To  realize  that  you  possess,  and  that  you  do,  either 
consciously  or  unconsciously,  create  every  condition,  is 
for  you  to  become  a  conscious  creator  at  all  times,  so 
that  by  creating  Ideals  to  your  desire  and  concentrating 
upon  them,  they  become  material  actualities. 
Concentration  is  the  only  mental  attitude  under  which 
Ideals  shape  themselves  into  the  physical  life.  As  long 
as  you  hold  an  Ideal  before  you,  that  long  is  it  shaping 
itself  in  your  body,  your  business  and  your  social  life. 
When  you  change  your  Ideal,  then  the  new  begins  to 
shape  itself.  What  has  been  your  practice  ?  Have  you, 
like  the  sculptor,  held  to  one  Ideal  till  it  "Carves  itself 
in  the  marble  real  ?"    Or  have  you  taken  the  Life-block 


Yo  CONCENTRATION; 

and  placed  it  in  the  hands  of  an  Ideal  to-day,  changing 
to  another  to-morrow,  and  then  to  another,  till  you  have 
had  as  many  Ideals  as  there  are  days?  Have  you  not 
changed  the  details  of  the  work  every  hour?  You  de- 
cided in  the  morning  you  would  have  a  statue  of 
Health,  but  before  noon  you  changed  it  to  Pain,  at 
midday  to  Grief,  at  mid-afternoon  to  Success,  and  at 
sunset  to  a  Satyr  laughing  at  Failure,  and  at  bedtime 
to  Eemorse,  and  awaken  at  morn  with  a  statue  of 
Hope?  Is  not  your  life  a  composite  of  all  these  and 
a  thousand  more  ?  And  this  because  you  have  not  held 
one  picture  before  it  long  enough  for  the  picture  to 
become  fixed  as  a  mental  habit.  Concentration  means 
holding  the  chosen  mental  picture  to  the  exclusion  of 
all  others  till  your  objective  life  becomes  the  picture. 
''1  AM  THAT  WHICH  I  THINK  MYSELF  TO  BE  !" 
The  Ideal  Life  is  the  Eeal  Life  and  this  unseen  Ideal 
Life  is  the  one  that  alone  concerns  us.  The  laws  of 
matter,  are  the  Laws  of  spirit.  They  are  but  reflections 
of  the  unseen  Laws,  because  Nature  is  one.  No  line 
can  be  drawn  between  the  Here  and  the  There ;  between 
the  present  and  the  past,  or  the  future ;  between  Cause 
and  Effect.  The  Universe  is  a  Unit,  and  as  such  we  are 
to  live  It.  Not  to  live  in  it,  but  to  live  It,  for  we  are 
It.  This  Life  of  the  body  that  has  so  troubled  iis,  is 
the  life  of  appearance,  and  with  appearances  hereafter 
we  are  not  to  deal ;  will  deal  with  eternal  verities,  i.  e. 
with  Ideals  which  cause  these  appearances.  The  goal 
of  every  endeavor  is  Ideal,  and  that  Ideal  is  REALITY 
OF  SPIRIT.  Let  this  Ideal  manifest  in  perfect  faith, 
by  letting  it  alone,  save  to  hold  to  it  as  Will. 
Tlio  Ideal  will  carry  you  to  the  goal  of  its  own  mani- 
festation. 


—THE  ROAD  TO  SUCCESS.  71 

"A  thread  of  Law  runs  through  thy  prayer 

Stronger  than  iron  cables  are; 

And  Love  and  Longing  towards  its  goal 

Are  pilots  sweet  to  guide  the  soul. 

So  Life  must  live,  and  Soul  must  sail 

And  Unseen  over  Seen  prevail 

And  all  God's  argosies  come  to  shore 

Though  ocean  smile  or  rage  and  roar." 
And  you  are  to  remember  that  this  voyage  of  unfold- 
ment  is  eternal  and  you  are  to  be  happy  every  rod  of 
the  way.    The  joy  of  life  is  in  creating,  in  unfolding, 
in  going  on. 

I  must  turn  to  the  poets  at  this  stage  of  the  discus- 
sion, for  they  are  the  truest  philosophers,  sages  and 
seers,  because  they  live  in  and  report  the  Ideal,  which 
is  Truth. 

I  close  this  section  with  a  little  poem  by  an  unknown 
author,  prefacing  it  with  extracts  from  Sam  Walter 
Foss  and  from  Kipling.  Foss  says: — 
There  is  no  bourn,  no  ultimate.  The  very  farthest  star, 
But  rims  a  sea  of  other  stars  extending  just  as  far. 
There's  no  beginning  and  no  end.  As  in  the  ages  gone 
The  greatest  joy  of  joys  shall  be — the  joy  of  going  on. 

Kipling  says  of  the  Ideal : — 

Our  face  is  far  from  this  our  war, 

Our  call  and  counter-cry, 
I  shall  not  find  Thee  quick  and  kind 

Nor  know  thee  till  I  die. 
Einough  for  me  in  dreams  to  see 

And  touch  Thy  garment's  hem; 
Thy  feet  have  trod  so  near  to  God 

1  may  not  follow  them. 

But  all  these  poets  fail  to  give  us  the  practical  lesson 
which  I  wish  you  to  draw  from  their  lines  and  that  is — 
hy  worshiping  the  Ideal,  i^e  become  that  Ideal. 
Therefore  there  is  no  better  practice  for  you  than  to 
concentrate  upon  beautiful  extracts  of  Great  Thinkers 
and  saintly  persons.     You  can  easily  find  them.     The 


72  CONCENTRATION: 

Twenty-third  Psalm  and  other  poetic,  and  therefore 
wise  passages  of  scripture  are  familiar,  so  I  do  not 
quote  them.  But  I  will  give  you  these  'foiled  down" 
expressions  from  the  poets  for  memorizing,  that  the 
mental  pictures  they  create  may  become  in  you  physical 
manifestations.  This  little  poem  tells  you  that  the 
realm  in  which  you  really  live  is  never  perfectly  re- 
flected in  the  objective  life.  So  regard  it  a  lesson  how 
to  live  the  Ideal  here  and  now. 

"I  think  that  the  song  that's  sweetest. 
Is  one  that  is  never  sung — 
But  lies  at  the  heart  of  the  singer, 
Too  grand  for  mortal  tongue, 
And  sometimes  in  the  silence 
Between  the  day  and  the  night, 
He  fancies  that  its  measures 
Bid  farewell  to  the  light. 

A  picture  that  is  fairer. 
Than  all  that  have  a  part. 
Among  the  master-pieces, 
In  the  marble  halls  of  art. 
Is  one  that  haunts  the  painter. 
In  all  his  golden  dreams, 
And  to  the  painter  only 
A  real  picture  seems. 
The  noblest  grandest  poem. 
Lies  not  in  blue  and  gold, 
Among  the  treasured  volumes 
The  rosewood   bookshelves  hold; 
But  in  bright  and  glowing  vision 
It  comes  to  the  poet's  brain, 
But  when  he  tries  to  grasp  it. 
He  finds  his  efforts  vain. 

A  fairy  hand  from  dream-land 
Beckons  us  here  and  there, 
And  when  we  strive  to  grasp  it 
It  vanishes  into  air. 
And  thus  our  fair  Ideal 
Floats  always   just  before, 
And  we  in  love  and  longing. 
Reach  for  it  ever  more." 

— Anonymous 


—THE  ROAD  TO  SUCCESS.  73 

I  wonder  if  ever  a  song  was  sung 

But  the  singer's  heart  sang  sweeter! 
I  wonder  if  ever  a  rhyme  was  sung, 

But  the  thoughts  surpassed  the  meter! 
I  wonder  if  ever  a  sculptor  wrought, 

Till  the  stone   echoed  his  ardent  thought! 
Or  if  ever  a  painter  in  light  and  shade 

The  dream  of  his  inmost  heart  conveyed. 

— J.  G.  Harney. 

That  haunting  dream  of  better,  forever  at  our  side, 
It  tints  the  far  horizon,  it  sparkles  on  the  tide. 
The  cradle  of  the  present  too  narrow  is  for  rest. 
The  feet  of  the  Immortal  leap  forth  to  seek  the  Best. 

— Lucy  Larcom. 

In  my  first  little  book  I  gave  the  Law  thus,  and  I  have 

never  been  able  to  improve  upon  it.     Let  it  close  this 

section : 

Affirm  that  which  you  desire  as  a  present  reality. 

Live  as  if  it  were  already  manifest. 

And  you  shall  find  it  manifest. 

I  will  here,  in  view  of  what  has  been  said,  translate  it 

thus : — 

Create  an  Ideal. 

Live  that  Ideal;  and 

You  will  become  that  Ideal. 

Concentration   upon,   and   consecration  to,   the    Ideal, 

brings  it  into  manifestation. 


74  CONCENTRATION: 


SECTION    XIII. 


PEAYER. 


Prayer  is   the   Soul's   sincere   desire. 

— Hymn. 

Men  pray  cream  and  live  skim-milk. 

— Beecher. 

Prayer  is  a  form  of  concentration.    Men  pray  to  their  ideals. 

— Theodore  Parker. 
Uttered  not  but  comprehended 
Is   the    Spirit's   voiceless   prayer. 

— Longfellow. 
More  things  are  wrought  by  prayer 
Than  this  world  dreams  of. 

— Tennyson. 

And  so  I  sometimes  think  our  prayers 

Might  well  be  merged  in  one, 
And  nest  and  perch,  and  hearth  and  church, 
Repeat  "Thy  will  be  done!" 

— Whittier. 
O  Indra!   have  mercy  upon  me  and  give  me  daily  bread! 
Sharpen  my  mind  like  edge  of  iron!     Whatever  I  now  utter 
longing  for  thee,  do  thou  accept  it!     Make  me  possessed 
of  Thee. 

— Rig  Veda.    (Quoted  l)y  Max  Muller.) 

The  influence  of  a  calm  trust  and  faith  expressing  itself  in 
prayer,  uttered  or  unexpressed,  over  the  functions  of  or- 
ganic life,  cannot  be  over-estimated.  It  is  a  spiritual  and 
potential  influence  and  force  brought  to  bear  upon  the  hid- 
den spring  of  disease.  It  is  one  of  the  most  potent  prophy- 
lactic agencies  against  the  inception  and  cause  of  all 
morbid  conditions,    *    *    ♦ 

—F.  W.  Evans. 

Among  the  many  forms  and  methods  of  concentration, 
prayer  is  the  most  common  and  the  most  potent.  The 
secret  of  the  religious  world  has  been  that  by  prayer 


—THE  ROAD  TO  SUCCESS.  75 

at  altar,  with  prayer-book,  through  hymn,  ritual,  rite, 
and  environment,  it  has  led  the  soul  to  contemplation 
of  holy  thoughts,  and  through  concentrating  upon  them, 
the  thought  thus  sown  in  the  mind  has  influenced  the 
life  for  good.  You  can  learn  valuable  lessons  from 
any  church  service.  Any  form,  any  rite,  any  book,  any 
ritual,  written  prayer,  or  hymn  has  a  value  to  the  one 
who  concentrates  upon  it  as  Truth,  oi  as  a  way  to  Truth 
It  is  not  through  form  or  book,  but  through  the  thought 
—through  the  attitude  of  the  Mind  that  benefits  come. 
There  Power  lies.  We  would  partake  of  the  charity 
and  humility  of  Whittier  when  he  says : — 

A  bending  staff  I  would  not  break, 

A  feeble  faith  I  would  not  shake, 

Nor  even  rashly  pluck  away 

The  error  that  some  truth  may  stay, 

Whose  loss  might  leave  the  soul  without 

A  shield  against  the  shafts  of  doubt. 

All  these  religious  institutions  grew  out  of  human  needs 
and  minister  to  human  needs,  because  they  are  but 
methods  of  concentration  under  holy  thoughts;  to  the 
extent  they  are  accepted  in  faith,  they  produce  results 
in  holy  living.  For  this  reason  noble  characters  are 
found  in  every  clime  and  under  every  creed.  They 
concentrated  upon  their  Ideals  in  religious  services. 
The  Ideal  element  in  each  draws,  inspires  and  holds. 
Paul  gave  the  Philippians  a  most  excellent  rule,  when 
he  said : — "That  ye  may  approve  things  that  are  excel- 
lent; that  ye  may  be  sincere  and  void  of  offence."  Sin- 
cerity is  the  only  condition  of  receptivity  and  that  Ideal 
which  we  sincerely  accept,  we  cling  to  till  it  manifests. 
But  prayer  is  the  "Soul's  sincere  desire !"  we  pray  from 
the  Ideal  and  to  the  extent  that  we  are  persistent  in 


76  CONCENTRATION; 

our  prayer,  it  becomes  realized  in  the  objective  life. 
"Pray  without  ceasing!'^  can  only  mean,  "Concentrate 
upon  the  desire  expressed  in  your  prayer/^  Again  we 
are  told,  "Whatever  things  ye  desire,  when  ye  pray 
believe  that  ye  have  received  them  and  ye  shall  have 
them!"  This  is  the  statement  in  another  form  of  the 
principle  of  Affirmation.  Affirm  that  you  are  the  Ideal 
and  through  that  Affirmation  you  create  conditions 
through  which  the  Ideal  shall  manifest.  Thus  there 
is  but  one  Principle,  uniform  in  all  its  operations  in 
all  religions  and  in  no  religion.  Without  understand- 
ing men  have  unconsciously  obeyed  the  Law.  That 
Law  is  found  in  the  Principle  of  Concentration  in  sin- 
cerity upon  the  ideal.  This  is  but  another  way  of 
saying  "I  AM  THAT  WHICH  I  THINK  I  AM!" 
I  pray,  thinking  I  have  received,  and  lo !  I  have  re- 
ceived. Thus  prayer  is  a  common  and  instinctive 
method  of  arriving  at  health,  happiness  and  success 
through  Concentration.  Tennyson  tells  us  "More  things 
are  wrought  by  prayer  than  this  world  dreams  of," 
because  through  prayer  the  Principle  of  Concentration 
is  applied  to  daily  living.  When  the  Law  is  understood 
and  practiced  by  you,  you  will  have  found  the  only  way 
in  which  conscious  man  has  directed  his  development. 
He  has  wrought  through  the  concentration  as  Will, 
upon  that  thought  which  is  horn  of  desire.  Any  form 
of  prayer  which  one  sincerely  uses,  will  work  the  end 
which  is  desired  in  the  Thought  expressed.  Thoughts 
are  materialized  into  life  through  prayer.  Therefore 
the  selfish  and  the  generous,  the  proud  and  the  humble, 
the  ill  and  the  well,  the  failures  and  the  successes,  may 
all  use  the  same  formulas,  utter  the  same  prayers,  but 


—THE  ROAD  TO  SUCCESS.  77 

the  results  in  each  life  will  be  as  different  as  are  the 
feelings  awakened  by  the  petition;  for  the  objective 
results  are  decided  by  the  real  desires  of  the  heart  and 
not  by  the  words.  Since  most  of  the  prayers  are  selfish 
and  personal,  looking  to  some  outside  power  for  help, 
asking  for  something  which  the  petitioner  really  posses- 
ses, but  is  not  conscious  of  possessing,  the  answers,  like 
the  petitions,  are  selfish  and  limited  to  temporary  and 
personal  likes.  Should  a  person  of  quick  temper  pray 
sincerely  to  be  cured  of  the  habit,  he  will  be  cured  as 
he  says : — "Lead  me  not  into  temptation."  But  should 
he  pray  through  fear  of  the  pain  which  an  outburst  of 
anger  brings,  he  will  find  relief  from  present  pain,  but 
not  from  the  cause,  which  will  remain  to  bring  pain 
again  through  another  outburst  of  anger.  So  with  sick- 
ness; a  prayer  for  health  will  be  answered  according  to 
the  faith  in  which  the  prayer  is  uttered.  "Lord !  Save 
or  I  perish!"  will  bring  salvation  according  to  the 
thought  embodied  in  the  words  expressed,  and  not  ac- 
cording to  the  Power  really  dwelling  within  any  person, 
potentate,  or  God,  outside  the  Soul  of  the  one  who  prays. 
God-In- You  answers  His  o^vn  prayer.  He  cannot 
answer  till  you  give  him  opportunity  by  making  con- 
ditions by  faith. 

Prayer  is  the  best  method  of  cultivating  faith,  for 
through  it  one  learns  to  "Cast  his  burdens"  off  his 
conscious  mind  and  allow  the  thought  born  of  the  Ideal 
to  fall  into  the  sub-conscious,  there  to  become  the  di- 
rector of  the  conscious  expression.  Prayer  is  the  state 
of  forgetfulness  of  the  present  and  of  the  objective 
self;  a  state  of  concentration  and  is  entered  into  with 
some  dominant  thought  which  has  the  power  of  an 


78  CONCENTRATION : 

Auto- Suggestion.  This  Auto-Suggestion  is  received  by 
the  Sub-conscious  and  creates  the  spiritual  condition 
desired,  and  that  condition  produces  the  desired  object- 
ive results.  Therefore  when  one  says,  '^I  cannot  con- 
centrate," I  reply — Each  time  you  sincerely  desire  you 
are  concentrated.  Each  time  a  wish  becomes  desire 
you  are  praying;  you  are  concentrating.  The  thought 
of  this  section  is  beautifully  expressed  by  a  poem  trans- 
lated from  the  Arabian,  by  James  Freeman  Clarke : 

"Allah!    Allah!"  cried  the  sick  man,  racked  with  pain  the 

long  night  through, 
Till  with  prayer  his  heart  grew  tender,'  and  his  lips  like 

honey  grew. 
But  at  morning  came  the  tempter,  said, — "Call  louder,  child 

of  pain! 
See  if  Allah  ever  answers,  'Here  am  I,  again'." 
Like  a  stab  the  cruel  cavil  through  his  brain  and  pulses 

went. 
To  his  heart  an  icy  coldness,  to  his  brain  a  darkness  sent. 
Then  before  him  stands  Elias,  says,  "My  child  why  thus 

dismayed? 
Dost  repent  thy  former  fervor?     Is  thy  soul  of  prayer, 

afraid?" 
"Ah!"   he   cried,   "I've   called   so   often;    never  heard   the 

'Here  am  I!' 
And  I  thought,  'God  will  not  pity!     Will  not  turn  on  me 

his  eye!' " 
Then  the  grave  Elias  answered,  "God  said,  'Rise  Elias,  Go; 
Speak  to  him  the  sorely  tempted;   lift  him  from  his  gulf 

of  woe. 
Tell  him  that  his  very  longing,  is  itself  my  answering  cry. 
That  his   prayer,   'Come   gracious   Allah!'   is   my  answer, 

'Here  am  I' 
Every  inmost  aspiration  is  God's  answer  undelBled; 
And    in    every    'O,    My    Father!'    slumbers    deep    a    'Here 

my  child.' " 


-THE  ROAD  TO  SUCCESS.  79 


SECTION  XIV. 


DESIKE  VERSUS  WISH. 

Want  fewer  things  but  want  those  few  things  more. 

— Elizabeth  Towne. 

Hunger  goes  selfishly  thinking  of  food; 
Evil  lies   painfully   yearning  for  Good. 

— John  Boyle  O'Reily. 
I   only   ask   a   will   resigned, 
O  Father,  to  thine  own! 

— Whittier. 
The  one  prudence  of  life  is  concentration;   the  one  evil, 
dissipation.     Everything  is   good   which   takes   away   one 
plaything  and  delusion  more,  and  drives  us  home  to  add 
one  more  stroke  of  faithful  work. 

— Emerson. 

"Will  concentration  bring  me  what  I  desire  ?  0 !  I 
want  something  so  much  T'  thus  writes  a  friend  of  many 
years. 

What  is  desire  ?  I  must  consider  it,  as  the  consciousness 
of  the  pressure  of  the  unfolding  soul.  Could  conscious- 
ness be  given  the  rose-bud  in  spring-time,  I  think  it 
would  be  filled  with  desire;  outward  pressure  is  ex-pres- 
sure. So  desire  in  the  Human  consciousness  is  but  the 
demand  of  the  soul  for  expansion  through  expression. 
Every  desire  must  be  gratified.  Hunger  is  the  prophecy 
of  food.  The  hunger  would  not  be  were  there  not  that 
which  can  satisfy  it.  Hunger  and  food  are  the  two  sides 
of  one  fact.  Hunger  the  subjective  side  and  food  the 
objective.  So  is  it  with  every  desire;  it  not  only  can 
be  but  it  is  gratified. 

But  here  is  one  important  thought,  one  which  will  help 
you  to  an  understanding  of  my  assertion.    There  is  here 


80  CONCENTRATION: 

all  the  difference  between  principle  and  detail;  between 
the  universal  and  the  individual;  between  desire  and 
the  thing  desired;  all  the  difference  there  is  between 
hunger  in  the  abstract  and  hunger  for  a  particular  food. 
Desire  is  soul-hunger — for  what?  For  expression  only. 
The  soul,  like  the  starling  in  Sterne's  essay,  cries,  "I 
want  to  get  out  V  But  it  does  not  cry  for  any  particu- 
lar way  or  place  in  which  to  get  out.  Desire  is  of  the 
subjective,  of  the  spiritual  life.  That  which  gratifies 
desire  is  of  the  reason,  of  experience,  of  the  objective 
life.  When  you  ask  me,  "Will  my  desire  be  gratified?'' 
I  answer  yes.  ''Will  my  desire  for  that  particular  thing 
be  gratified?"  That  depends  upon  your  choice,  your 
persistency,  your  will.  Desire  causes  us  to  want.  Then 
we  ask  ourselves,  what  we  want.  Often  in  this  condition 
we  wish.  Wishing  is  weakness;  is  dissipation  of  our 
forces.  In  wishing  the  Ideal  is  held  momentarily  and 
is  changed  so  often  that  life  becomes  a  composite  of 
many  pictures,  none  of  which  have  taken  shape  and 
given  satisfaction  to  the  conscious  mind;  but  because 
there  has  been  expression  in  wishing  and  the  soul 
has  partial  satisfaction.  No  habit  is  more  weakening 
than  that  of  wishing — day-dreaming.  It  is  idling  away 
hours,  vitiating  the  stream  of  life  with  mental  poison, 
"vain  imaginings,"  that  simply  flit  through  the  mind 
leaving  it  weak,  because  as  Will,  the  Ego  is  not  trained 
to  hold  any  one  of  them  till  it  makes  an  impression  upon 
the  objective  life.  Desire,  taking  form  in  a  mental 
picture  held  by  the  Will  until  it  materializes,  gives  sat- 
isfaction to  the  conscious  mind.    Lowell  says : — 

But,   would   we  learn   that  heart's  full   scope 

Which  we  are  hourly  wronging, 
Our  lives  must  climb  from  hope  to  hope 

And  realize  our  longing. 


—THE  ROAD  TO  SUCCESS.  81 

Then  aside  with  wishing,  day-dreaming,  absent-minded 
hours,  where  we  drift  without  helm  or  rudder ;  and  in 
their  stead,  select  that  thing,  or  that  condition,  which 
will  satisfy  desire;  lop  off  all  others;  give  away  one 
more  delusion  and  go  home  through  this  concentration 
of  desire  to  more  faithful,  because  more  earnest,  work. 
Be  sincere  in  your  desire  for  things;  be  persistent  in 
your  desire  for  any  one  thing;  then  you  must  win. 
Desire  things  less,  and  desire  growth,  unfoldment,  and 
expression  more.  It  is  not  the  thing  that  is  of  benefit, 
but  the  power  to  thus  express : — 

"I've  found  some  wisdom  in  my  quest 

That's  richly  worth  retailing; 
I've  learned  when  one  has  done  his  best, 

There  is  no  harm  in  failing. 
I  may  not  reach  what  I  pursue 

Still  will  I  keep  pursuing; 
Nothing  is  vain  that  I  can  do. 

Since  soul-growth  comes  of  doing." 

Desire  less  things  in  number  but  desire  those  less  things 
tremendously,  but  not  anxiously  nor  nervously.  Keep 
at  it  with  as  steady  a  pull  as  do  the  crack  crew  of  the 
college.  Jesus  gave  the  law  which  is  never  failing:^ 
"Seek  first  the  kingdom  of  Go(o)d  and  its  righteous- 
ness and  all  things  will  be  added."  I  think  if  I  state 
the  law  thus  you  will  understand  it: — 
Seek  first  the  consciousness  of  Power  within  your  soul 
where  All-power  centers;  live  in  accordance  with  soul 
laws,  then  things  become  subject  to  you. 
Before  you  can  make  effort  to  the  attainment  of  any- 
thing, you  must  feel  it  is  possible  for  you  to  attain  it. 
There  must  be  the  Affirmation  first  of  all— 7  desire  this. 
Then  there  must  arise  the  sense  of  power  to  have,  to 
do,  and  to  be,  which  finds  expression  in,  I  can!    Then 


82  CONCENTRATION: 

there  must  come  the  important  decision  I  Will!  Now 
comes  the  tug  of  war,  the  point  where  so  many  fail. 
They  will  to  do,  and  do  not.  Having  willed,  you  must 
put  that  decision  into  the  keeping  of  the  Will,  and  know, 
that  at  that  moment  you  possess  the  thing  desired.  The 
afhrmation  for  this,  be  it  a  thing  desired,  is  I  have! 
Be  it  an  action,  the  Affirmation  is  I  do !  Do  you  desire 
health?  Follow  the  evolution  of  the  thought  thus: — 
I  have  power  to  heal  myself  because  Infinite  Life  finds 
expression  through  me.  Being  infinite  I  can  heal  my- 
self. Because  I  can^  and  desire  it,  I  will!  Because  I 
have  the  power,  desire  and  will,  and  have  so  decreed 
I  am  healed/' 

From  the  moment  you  make  this  decision  let  not  that 
mental  picture  of  health  pass  from  your  mind.  The 
healing  must  begin  at  Cause,  which  is  your  mind,  and 
the  effect  will  show  as  health  in  your  body. 
This  desire  for  expression  is  seen  in  children.  They 
want  to  do  something.  Wise  parents  and  teachers  give 
them  something  to  do.  Soul  demands  expression.  When 
it  is  denied  to  children  in  a  channel  we  desire  for  them, 
they  take  the  one  that  offers,  and  we  call  it  mischief, 
if  we  do  not  brand  it,  evil.  But  remember  the  law  of  all 
force.  It  moves  in  the  line  of  least  resistance.  Human 
desire  is  a  manifestation  of  force.  It  will  move  in  the 
easiest  line  if  not  directed.  The  same  tendency  to  do, 
and  to  let,  blind  desire  lead  them  is  seen  in  gi-own  peo- 
ple. "\A^iat  to  do?''  is  their  cry.  And  when  there  is 
not  purpose,  direction  and  self-control,  they  move  in 
ways  we  deem  unwise.  Ills,  evils  and  crimes  are  but 
the  results  of  undirected  desire.  All  desire  will  find 
expression.     It  says: — "I'll  find  a  way  or  make  one!" 


—THE  ROAD  TO  SUCCESS.  83 

And  it  must  make  one,  for  the  individual  must  express 
or  die,  because  what  we  call  Life  is  the  expression  of 
Soul  through  the  body. 

Therefore  where  you  have  desire,  give  it  expression, 
for  if  the  way  is  not  chosen  and  direction  is  not  given, 
it  will  find  some  way.  Repressed  desires,  and  repressed 
emotions  arising  from  them  are  the  cause  of  every  ill 
of  body,  mind  or  estate.  You  are  even  to  remember, 
that  you  as  Will  must  take  charge  of  your  judgment, 
must  direct  desire,  or  it  will  run  riot.  Directed  desire 
is  the  source  of  all  success.  Undirected  desire  is  the 
cause  of  all  that  we  term  evil.  Desire  is  soul-force. 
Never  forget  this,  then  you  will  never  ask:  "Will  my 
desire  be  gratified  ?"  Force  will  find  expression.  Desire 
is  your  Life  demanding  expression.  Will  you  diffuse 
it  like  heat  lightning  on  a  summer's  night,  or  will  you 
confine  and  direct  it  till  it  is  the  light  upon  your  path 
and  the  motor  power  to  your  success? 
A  story  is  told  of  a  student  who  upon  entering  college 
placed  over  the  door  of  his  room  a  large  red  V.  "What 
is  it  for  ?"  he  was  often  asked,  but  he  never  told.  There 
it  remained  during  the  four  years  of  his  college  life. 
He  came  out  the  valedictorian.  On  his  last  evening  in 
his  room,  he  invited  his  friends  and  pointing  to  the  V, 
said: — "ISTow,  you  know  what  V  stands  for.  I  have 
won.  I  determined  when  I  entered  here  to  be  valedic- 
torian. That  was  placed  there  to  keep  in  mind  my 
decision." 

Is  this  not  vv^hat  is  meant  by  "keeping  thine  eye  single, 
then  shall  thy  whole  body  be  full  of  light."  This 
young  man,  ignorant  of  the  law,  acted  under  it.  He 
may,  in  his  concentration  upon  this  one  thing,  have  lost 


84  CONCENTRATION: 

his  health,  but  it  illustrates  this  principle,  that  you 
cannot  scatter  your  mental  powers  over  too  many  mere 
wishes.  You  must  "climh  from  hope  to  hope  and 
realize  your  longings,"  by  holding  them  as  mental 
images  and  letting  them  materialize.  Can  you  realize 
your  desire?  Yes.  This  lesson  tells  you  how.  Will 
you  pay  the  price?  Is  it  worth  your  endeavor?  Will 
it  give  you  satisfaction?  How  many  of  the  illusions 
and  playthings  in  your  life  w^ill  you  give  up  for  it? 
You  cannot  have  every  little  whim  gratified,  and  then 
have  some  great  desire  satisfied  also.  Put  your  powder 
into  Fourth  of  July  explosions  and  your  energy  into 
social  dissipation  and  you  will  have  no  power  for  de- 
fense, and  no  energy  for  the  battle.  "Why  do  I  fail?" 
so  many  ask  me.  Here  is  your  answer: — Dissipation 
of  your  energies  by  the  satisfying  of  mere  whims,  in 
the  dream  born  of  temporary  wants;  by  mental  pyro- 
technics; by  living  under  ignoble  motives,  sacrificing 
to  superficial  social  pleasures  or  directed  by  low  aims. 
Concentrate  upon  something  worth  while  and  then  stick. 
You  will  then  win  and  the  result  in  the  treasury  of 
Eternity  is  Character.  It  is  the  sticking  that  counts. 
Hence  this  is  your  Affirmation — I  am  persevering.  I 
never  fail. 

Memorize  these  glorious  lines  of  Emerson  and  never 
doubt  your  ability  again: 

Laurel   crowns   cleave  to   deserts, 
And  power  to  him  who  power  exerts. 
Hast  not  thy  share?     On  winged  feet 
Lo!  it  flyeth  thee  to  meet. 
All  that  nature  made  thine  own, 
Floating  in  air  or  pent  in  stone. 
Will  rive  the  hills,  and  swim  the  sea, 
And  like  thy  shadow  follow  thee. 


,.( 


UNJ' 
—THE  ROAD  TO  SUCCESS.  \  85 


SECTION  XV. 

MEOSTTAL  POISE. 

My  peace  I  leave  with  you. 

— Jesus. 
But  when  the  heart  is  full  of  din, 
And  doubt  beside  the  portal  waits, 
They  can  but  listen  at  the  gates 
And  hear  the  household  jar  within. 

— Tennyson. 

Right  is  Right,  since  God  is  God, 
And  Right  the  day  must  win! 

To  doubt  would  be  disloyalty! 
To  falter  would  be  sin. 

— Old  Hymn. 

Where  concentration  is,  there  is  a  mental  peace.  Un- 
rest denotes  a  mind  wandering  and  unstable.  Therefore 
would  you  have  reflected  from  the  sub-conscious  store- 
house of  wisdom  into  the  consciousness,  the  wisdom 
for  the  moment,  there  must  be  mental  quiet.  In  this 
quietness  the  mind  becomes  like  a  still  lake  and  the 
light  within  is  so  reflected  that  you  know  what  to  do. 
Concentration  means  peace  of  mind.  Seek  this  condi- 
tion for  success  in  any  undertaking. 
A  good  way  to  seek  this  is  to  concentrate  upon  some 
passage  of  literature  that  has  quieting  power.  The 
story  of  Jesus  stilling  the  tempest  illustrates  the  power 
of  the  soul  to  still  the  storms  of  the  mental  life.  Think, 
"Peace  be  still,"  and  hold  the  mind  upon  some  passage 
of  quieting  verse  or  text.  I  find  myself  repeating  verses 
long  ago  memorized,  and  as  it  has  been  my  habit  from 
youth  to  memorize  poems,  there  is  always  in  my  mind 
one  ready  for  the  occasion.  If  you  will  memorize  the 
following  stanzas,  or  passages  at  beginning  of  sections 


86  CONCENTRATION: 

in  this  book,  they  will  bring  that  mental  poise  which 
will  prepare  you  for  any  particular  thought  you  may 
wish  to  hold.  Many  have  found  in  this  stanza  of  Whit- 
tier's  power  to  help  them  and  out  of  the  maddening 
mazes  of  life  to  bring  peace  of  mind.  You  will  find 
John  Burrough's,  "Waiting'^  helpful  and  from  the  vol- 
umes of  NOW,  you  will  be  able  to  cull  Affirmations  and 
stanzas  that  will  give  this  mental  quietude. 

Amid  the  maddening  maze  of  things 

And  tossed  by  storm  and  flood, 
To  one  fixed  trust  my  spirit  clings — 

I  know  tnat  God  is  good. 

This  stanza  from  one  of  my  poems  may  suit  those  who 
have  any  objection  to  the  word  "God.'^ 

Trust  is  now  brooding  in  my  heart 

As  thus  I  float  o'er  Fassions's  grave, 
I'm  Spirit  and  of  All-Life  part. 
As  such  unmoved  by  wind  or  wave. 

Affirmations  of  peace  and  of  restfulness  are  always  to 
precede  any  special  Affirmation,  for  until  Peace  of  mind 
is  reached,  there  can  be  no  concentration.  Therefore 
the  Affirmation — I  am  peace — is  recommended.  The 
words  of  one  of  Mrs.  Scott's  "Truth  Songs"  will  help 
you  as  you  repeat,  hum  or  sing  them : 

God  is  peace;    (or — I  am  Peace.) 

That  Peace  surrounds  me. 
In  that  Peace  I  safely  dwell. 

'Tis  above,  beneath,  within  me. 
Peace  is  mine  and  all  is  well; 

God  is  Peace,  sweet  Peace! 
God  is  Peace,  pure  Peace! 

That  Peace  is  mine — mine — 
And  all  is  well. 

Keep  repeating  the  thought  of  peace,  till  peace  is  yours. 
When  once  you  have  attained  self-mastery  in  this  di- 
rection, you  can  follow  it  up  successfully  in  all  others. 
Can  affirm;  Health,  Happiness,  Success,  or  any  desire 
as  a  present  reality. 


I 


-THE  ROAD  TO  SUCCESS.  87 


SECTION  XVI. 


METHODS   OF   CONCENTRATION. 


Resolve  to  be  thyself;  and  know  tliat  lie 
Who  finds  himself  loses  his  misery. 

— Matthew  Arnold. 

No  longer  forward  nor  behind 

I  look  in  hope  or  fear; 
But  grateful  take  the  good  I  find, 

The  best  of  now  and  here. 

— Whittier. 

Our  efficiency  consists  so  much  in  our  concentration,  that 
nature  usually  in  the  instances  where  a  marked  man  is 
sent  into  the  world,  overloads  him  with  bias,  sacrificing 
symmetry  to  working  power. 

— Emerson. 

People  have  interpreted  Concentration  to  mean  a  kind  of 
worrying  over  some  "ideal" — a  mental  treatment  has  been 
understood  as  a  strained  holding  of  a  certain  thought — 
will-power  has  been  looked  upon  as  bulldog  tenacity. 
Instead  of  all  this  mental  wear  and  tear,  let  us  now  ascend 
to  the  throne  of  Faith  and  Love,  and  with  cheerfulness 
and  self-reliance  build  better  conditions. 

Instead  of  holding  on  so  tightly,  why  not  let  go — give  a 
chance  for  the  expression  of  the  infinite  potencies.  The 
control  of  one's  thoughts  should  be  undertaken  easily — 
no  impatience — no  hurry — no  strain.  What  is  there  to 
strive  for?  We  are  now  heirs  to  celestial  conditions;  hap- 
piness is  immediately  ours  if  we  will  let  go,  if  we  will 
keep  quiet, 
keep  quiet. — Fred  Bury. 

Understand  that  peace  of  mind  will  not  allow  yon  to 

be  anxions,  or  fearful,   or  timid^   or  rigid;  will  not 

allow  any  thought  of  doubt  of  the   righteousness   of 

your  conduct.    You  can  hold  no  ^*^must''  over  yourself. 

"I  do  this  because  I  like  to  do  it!^-*  is  the  true  spirit. 


88  CONCENTRATION: 

In  this  spirit  you  can  relax;  throw  off  all  care  and 
simply  let  the  thought,  which  for  the  time  you  have 
chosen,  have  its  way  through  and  over  you. 

In  applying  these,  or  any  directions  do  not  think  any 
serious  loss  will  be  yours  if  you  do  not  obey  them. 
Never  rigidly  hold  to  them.  If  you  do  not  use  them, 
you  only  place  yourself  where  the  boy  is  who  prefers 
play  to  dinner  and  goes  without.  You  are  to  give  your- 
self perfect  liberty,  cast  aside  all  fears  and  then — trust. 
In  this  mental  state,  select  that  portion  of  time  you 
can  readily  give  to  Silence,  be  it  ten  minutes,  or  an 
hour.  AYlien  you  have  selected  it,  make  it  as  much  your 
business  to  attend  to  it,  as  you  would  to  attend  the 
lesson  of  the  professor  you  have  engaged  for  music  or 
painting  lessons.  Be  as  prompt  to  an  appointment  with 
yourself,  as  to  one  with  a  friend. 

Sincerity  demands  this.  Reasonable  excuses  will  be 
accepted  here  as  elsewhere,  but  neglect  will  tell  upon 
your  unfoldment.  It  is  your  business  at  this  hour. 
"Attend  to  business  in  business  hours."  Failure  to  feel 
the  importance  of  punctuality,  and  failure  to  realize 
the  importance  of  time  and  effort  here,  are  the  great 
cause  of  the  many  not  attaining  the  power  of  the 
Silence. 

Having  chosen  the  time,  select  the  place.  It  should 
be  away  from  all  other  persons  if  possible,  in  a  room 
by  yourself,  where  you  can  have  external  quiet.  But 
when  you  have  mastered,  you  will  enter  Silence  any- 
where, at  any  time.  Alone  or  in  midst  of  a  crowd.  To 
be  able  anywhere  and  at  any  time  to  concentrate  upon 
a  chosen  thing  is  to  be  your  purpose. 


—THE  ROAD  TO  SUCCESS.  89 

If  you  cannot  have  a  room  by  yourself,  then  give  your- 
self the  Afl&rinatioiis  silently  wherever  you  are.  The 
hymn  says: — 

"Should  holy  thoughts  come  o'er  thee 
When  friends  are  round  thy  way, 

E'en  then  the  silent  breathings 
Thy  spirit  sends  above, 

Will  reach  his  throne  of  glory, 
Who  is  mercy,  truth  and  love." 

Having  selected  time  and  room,  take  a  restful  position, 
one  of  perfect  bodily  ease.  Not  a  lazy  or  careless  one, 
but  one  of  perfect  relaxation;  relaxation  for  a  purpose. 
Let  go  of  all  thoughts  of  material  things,  including 
body,  home,  business,  and  friends. 
Draw  a  few  long  breaths  with  the  thought : — /  am  rest- 
ing.   I  am  peaceful. 

Fix  your  mind  upon  yourself  as  a  Divine  Being;  as  a 
manifestation  of  the  One  Universal  Principle  that  fills 
all  space  and  time.  Think  of  yourself  thus  as  a  child 
of  the  One,  possessing  infinite  possibilities.  Affirm: — 
I  have  power  to  do  and  to  he  whatever  I  wish  to  do  and 
be.  See  yourself  perfect,  because  you  are  this  child  of 
the  Infinite.  Make  yourself  in  thought  one  with  All- 
that-is.  Affirm :— 7  AM  ONE  WITH  INFINITE  LIFE 
AND  WISDOM. 

When  you  become  perfectly  peaceful,  take  the  special 
thought  you  desire  to  have  manifest.  If  you  are  there 
to  rid  yourself  of  illness  take  this  thought: — In  the 
One  I  possess  all  life.  I  now  let  Life  manifest  in  per- 
fect health.  I  am  Life  and  in  the  life  of  the  One,  I  am 
healed. 

N".  B. — You  are  not  to  be  particular  about  the  form  of 
words.    Take  the  thought  in  any  form  of  words  you 


90  CONCENTRATION: 

choose.  It  is  not  the  words  but  the  Thought,  that  I 
wish  you  to  receive.  It  is  not  the  words  but  Thought 
that  direct  the  Sub-Conscious  Power.  Also  remember 
it  is  not  the  thought  that  heals  or  does  any  work.  Your 
body  was  built  before  you  were  capable  of  thinking. 
The  Power  that  heals,  or  gives  success,  is  the  Power 
that  built  your  body,  and  that  Power,  is  the  Universal 
Life.  But  since  you  are  a  self-conscious  individual, 
your  thought  directs  the  Life  into  the  mental  mould 
you  make  for  it,  in  your  Imagination.  Therefore  all 
you  have  to  care  for  is  your  Thought.  You  "press  the 
mental  button"  and  Life  does  the  rest. 

If  your  desire  is  success  in  any  particular  line,  create 
a  mental  image  of  success.  Do  not  try  to  see  how, 
or  when,  it  will  manifest,  but  in  faith  create  it  and  as 
you  wish  it  to  be  know  that  since  you  have  created  it 
in  thought,  it  will  manifest.  Use  the  thought  in  this 
Affirmation : — I  am  a  manifestation  of  Infinite  Wisdom 
and  I  possess  the  power  and  the  Tcnoivledge  to  bring 
success.  I  now  decree  for  myself  success.  It  is  now 
mine  and  will  manifest.    I  am  success. 

Whatever  be  the  desire  of  the  hour,  in  like  manner  thinlc 
upon  it,  and  know  that  through  mental  concentration 
it  does  manifest.  Forget  time  and  way,  and  expect  it 
to  come  at  the  right  time,  in  the  right  way.  It  will 
be  there  at  that  time. 

This  is  in  a  great  degree  but  a  repetition  of  a  previous 
section,  I  know,  but  you  need  it.  I  am  writing  a  text- 
book. 

Do  not  try  to  think.  After  you  have  decided  what  the 
thought  is,  you  are  to  make  no  effort,  but  are  to  give 


—THE  ROAD  TO  SUCCESS.  91 

yourself  up  to  it,  and  let  it  think  for  you.  When  the 
boy  whistled  in  school,  over  the  discovery  of  the  mis- 
take in  his  problem  and  was  chided,  he  replied,  truth- 
fully :— "It  whistled  itself !"  Let  your  thought  do  the 
whistling  while  you  simply  enjoy  the  session.  Soon 
Life  will  pulse  through  you ;  will  fill  your  Being.  You 
will  have  a  sense  of  interior  power.  Gradually  a  sweet 
peace  v^ill  steal  over  you,  and  you  will  sense  the  Infinite 
Mind  thinking  in  you;  the  Infinite  Life  vibrating  in 
you;  the  Infinite  Love,  loving  in  you  and  Infinite  Wis- 
dom guiding  in  you.  Life,  Love,  and  Strength  will 
fill  your  entire  being.  If  you  sink  into  unconsciousness, 
do  not  fear.  Let  any  condition  come  and  go  at  will. 
If  you  have  set  any  time  for  your  seance,  you  will  come 
back  to  the  objective  life  at  that  time..  Passivity,  you 
must  have.  When  the  thought  entirely  possesses  you, 
you  are  entirely  oblivious  of  the  objective  Hfe;  you 
have  no  attention  for  anything  else  but  the  ^^etting'' 
process, — letting  Life,  Love,  and  Truth  fill  you. 

Every  day  no  matter  where  you  are,  whenever  any 
thought  in  antagonism  to  the  selected  one  would  come 
into  your  mind,  affirm  the  thoughts  you  have  chosen. 
They  will  bring  the  desired  condition.  Overcome  any 
ill  thought  with  the  use  of  a  good  one  and  you  will 
soon  grow  into  the  power  of  controlling  your  thoughts. 
This  is  health ;  this  is  success.  Mind, — You  must  grow. 
"Consider  the  lilies,"  when  hereafter  you  ask  "How  T' — 
"They  grow !" 


92  CONCENTTIATION : 


SECTION  XVII. 


DIRECTIOISrS  FOR  PRACTICE. 

Like  a  beautiful  flower  full  of  color  but  without  fragrance 
are  all  the  fine  but  fruitless  words  of  him  who  does  not 
act  accordingly. 

— Dhammapada. 
Time  was,  I  sat  out  Truth  to  find. 
Heart-sick,  foot-sore,  aweary  grew  my  mind; 
When   haply — oh   my   pride!    what  bitter   cost!  — 
Truth  found  me  wandering.    I,  not  Truth,  was  lost. 

— Alfred  Young. 

The  only  way  to  change  conditions  effectually  is  to  change 
"the  heart,"  the  habit,  or  instinct-mind. 
This  can  be  done  with  more  or  less  ease,  according  to  the 
degree  of  setness  of  character  and  the  degree  of  will  and 
enthusiasm  brought  to  bear. 

The  key  to  all  change  of  character  lies  within  that  little 
five  per  cent  conscious  mind,  which  with  all  its  littleness 
is  a  sure  lever  by  which  to  move  the  ninety-five  per  cent 
ponderosity  below  it.  For  conscious  thought  is  positive 
thought,  dynamic;  while  subconscious  thought  is  negative, 
receptive.  That  little  five  per  cent  mind  has  stronger 
compelling  power  than  several  times  its  bulk  of  sub-con- 
scious mind,  and  there  is  not  an  atom  of  all  that  ninety- 
five  per  cent  sub-conscious  mind  which  cannot  be  moved 
by  that  little  five  per  cent  mind  which  lies  at  the  top. 
The  conscious  self  is  the  directing  power.  Just  as  it  di- 
rected your  fingers  to  change  their  fixed  habits,  so  it  can 
direct  any  change  in  other  lines  of  mental  or  bodily  habit — 
by  directing  persistently,  quietly  insistent  practice  on  tlie 
desired  lines.  Insist  upon  right  conscious  thinking,  and 
in  due  time  you  cannot  fail  to  have  right  sub-conscious 
thinking. 

— Elizabeth  Towne  in  ''The  Life  Power.'" 

Many  teachers  give  formulas;  there  is  a  belief  extant 

that  certain  positions;  directions  in  relation  to  points 

of   the   compass;   certain  minerals,   crystals^,   amulets, 


—THE  ROAD  TO  SUCCESS.  93 

talismans,  medicines,  herbs,  token,  are  necessary  to 
the  attainment  of  power. 

This  is  an  error.  Any  form,  formula,  position  of  body 
or  potion;  any  point  of  compass;  any  condition  of  en- 
vironment; believed  to  be,  or  found  at  any  time  to  be 
of  assistance,  is  of  present  assistance ;  and  may  be  used 
as  long  as  it  is  regarded  merely  as  a  means  to  a  develp- 
ment  that  will  enable  one  to  dispense  with  it.  Used 
that  it  may  be  outgrown. 

But,  the  moment  any  particular  thing,  or  condition, 
is  considered  necessary,  it  becomes  a  fetter  and  a  limit- 
ation; here  lies  the  danger  of  all  such  aids. 
The  only  necessary  condition  is  your  mental  attitude. 
Horace  Greely  said;  "The  only  way  to  resume  specie 
payments  is  to  resume;"  the  kindergarten  motto  is — 
"Learn  to  do  by  doing."  In  Hke  manner  I  say  to  my 
reader: — "The  only  way  to  concentrate  is  to  concen- 
trate." No  outside  aid  is  necessary  and  the  use  of  aids, 
unless  guided  by  the  thought  of  mere  temporary  assist- 
ances, is  attended  with  the  serious  danger  of  limitation. 
Any  place,  any  time,  is  the  proper  place  and  time.  Any 
chosen  thought  is  the  right  thought.  The  ideal  of 
Concentration  is — Ability  at  any  time  to  so  concentrate 
at  will  upon  a  chosen  thought  as  to  become  oblivious 
of  objective  environment.  This  ability  extends  to  busi- 
ness transactions,  social  intercourse,  literary  and  orator- 
ical exercises,  and  all  forms  of  psychic  manifestations, 
and  all  forms  of  healing. 

Not  long  ago  while  waiting  in  hall  for  lecture  and  chat- 
ting with  friends  I  was  called  upon  to  give  an  absent 
treatment.  It  was  successful.  A  friend  met  me  on 
the  street,  handed  me  a  letter  with  request  that   I 


94  CONCENTRATION: 

psychometrize  it.  Immediately,  as  we  continued  our 
walk,  I  became  oblivious  of  my  surroundings  and  de- 
scribed the  writer  and  those  persons  consulted  before 
the  writing ;  told  the  business ;  the  motive ;  gave  advice 
as  to  meeting  the  results ;  and  the  w^ay  to  answer. 

Too  many  sensitives,  psychics,  and  healers,  demand  con- 
ditions. The  only  condition  is  the  mental  one  of  Atten- 
tion. Notice  how  concentrated  and  still  is  a  regiment 
of  soldiers  at  the  command — "Attention!^'  Learn  like 
obedience  to  your  own  Auto-Suggestion. 

The  use  of  crystals,  sacred  words,  cards,  names,  and 
like  instrumentalities  is  a  staff  better  dispensed  with 
than  used. 

But  as  children  need  text-books,  slates,  pencils,  black- 
boards, apparatus,  the  quiet  of  school-room  and  pres- 
ence of  teacher,  that  they  may  develop  the  power  to  do 
without  all  these,  so  one  may  use  temporarily  some 
external  means  for  concentration. 

Once  I  used  to  develop  my  hypnotic  subjects  and  som- 
nambules  by  having  them  concentrate  their  gaze  upon 
something  bright;  I  would  help  my  patients  into 
quiescent  mental  attitude,  by  gazing  at  some  bright 
thing ;  but  I  found  it  harder  to  break  up  this  habit  when 
once  formed,  than  it  is  to  form  one  of  concentration 
without  any  external  aid.  "Think  sleep ;  and  you  will 
sleep !"  This  is  my  method ; — through  Affirmation. 

But  for  those  who,  without  assistance,  must  develop 
voluntary  concentration,  I  give  a  few  simple  methods. 
You  can,  until  you  develop  power  to  do  otherwise,  sub- 
due the  light  in  your  room  to  a  twilight.  May  choose 
a  convenient  room  and  time,  when  and  where  you  can 


—THE  ROAD  TO  SUCCESS.  95 

have  external  quiet;  but  at  same  time  remember,  that 
your  lesson  is  not  learned,  until  you  can  concentrate  in 
bright  sun-  or  gas-light,  anywhere.  Even  in  midst  of 
noise,  or  a  crowd. 

Having  selected  time  and  place,  put  yourself  in  easy 
position ;  one  in  which  you  forget  body.  I  do  not  rec- 
ommend a  recumbent  one  as  the  position  suggests  sleep, 
and  you  do  not  seek  involuntary  sleep. 

Take  an  easy  position,  read,  or  repeat  some  quieting 
extract.  Bring  some  pleasant  picture  before  the  mind. 
Eelax  the  body.  Close  the  eyes  and  concentrate  upon 
that  picture.  The  first  lesson  is  to  gain  the  ability 
to  look  upon  this  picture  you  have  created  with  the  same 
steadiness  you  would  look  upon  landscape  from  the 
window. 

The  next  lesson,  is  to  connect  some  thought  with  the 
picture  and  concentrate  upon  the  thought.  Do  not 
make  the  seance  so  long  as  to  tire  you.  Do  not  strain. 
Do  not  become  conscious  that  you  are  making  an  effort. 
Intend  the  mind,  and  then  let  it  float  with  the  current. 
Concentration  is  the  condition  of  perfect  ease.  No  task, 
no  strain,  no  effort,  no  conscious  thinking.  You  have 
directed  the  thought;  now  let  it  go  without  bit  or  rein. 
If  you  do  not  succeed  in  this,  you  may  choose  something 
upon  which  to  concentrate  the  gaze.  Something  with 
bright  color,  or  something  with  metallic  luster.  A  bit 
of  sunlight  on  the  wall,  a  flower,  a  gem,  anything. 
Gaze  upon  it  till  you  see  nothing  else,  then  close  the 
eyes  and  see  it  still. 

But  with  any  of  these  conditions,  or  one  you  may  gather 
from  any  other  author,  remember  it  is  the  thought  that 


96  CONCENTRATION: 

is  of  importance.  Know  that  you  can  hefore  you  begin, 
and  hnow  that  you  do  while  you  are  at  the  lesson. 
The  ideal  condition  is  that  which  while  in  it,  you  do 
not  notice  the  external ;  you  pay  no  attention  to  it,  but 
when  you  take  up  the  objective  life  again  with  positive- 
ness,  you  will  recall  that  certain  sounds,  persons  and 
events  occurred;  and  that  all  sounds  seemed  subdued 
and  far  away.  Somnolence,  sleepiness,  passivity,  is  the 
ideal  condition  when  entered  into  voluntarily.  Do  not 
let  these  seances  degenerate  into  mere  reverie  or  absent- 
mindedness,  nor  allow  yourself  to  go  into  these  condi- 
tions when  about  your  work.  If,  during  your  seance, 
you  feel  like  sleeping  let  sleep  come,  with  the  Suggestion 
that  you  will  waken  when  the  time  set  has  expired  and 
will  gain  what  you  seek  while  in  this  condition.  Fear 
not  and  let  what  will  come.  You  will  so  waken.  Be 
prompt  to  begin  and  to  close !  Bring  yourself  to  time, 
system  and  order;  this  is  mastery. 
It  is  probable  that  you  will  fall  to  sleep  for  quite  a 
period  while  you  are  learning.  It  is  well.  Do  not 
resist.  It  is  nature's  way  of  producing  an  equilibrium. 
Most  people  live  at  such  tension  in  this  complex,  stren- 
uous life  of  ours,  that  nature  by  reaction  rights  our 
nervous  system  in  these  rests.  Produces  an  equilibrium. 
^^Thou  shalt  not  come  out  thence  till  thou  has  paid  the 
utmost  farthing,"  we  are  told  by  Jesus.  Enjoy  these 
seances.  Soul-growth  comes  in  them.  They  are  not  the 
sleeps  of  the  night,  for  you  have  given  direction  to  the 
sub-conscious  and  while  you  are  thus  relaxing  your  will 
from  the  body.  Life  is  building  the  nervous  system 
into  condition  for  the  expression  of  your  desires.  Take 
with  you  the  right  Ideal  into  the  Silence,  and  then  give 
Liberty  to  Soul,  to  have  its  way. 


-THE  ROAD  TO  SUCCESS.  97 


SECTION  XVIII. 


HOW  TO  DO  IT. 


It  is  the  same  Force  in  the  human  breast, 
That  makes  us  gods  or  demons.    If  we  gird 
Those  strong  emotions  by  which  we  are  stirred 
With  might  of  will  and  purpose,  heights  unguessed 
Shall  dawn  for  us.    Or  if  we  give  them  sway 
We  can  sink  down  and  consort  with  the  lost. 

— Ella  Wheeler  Wilcox. 

The  truth  is  that  really  all  have  untold  treasures  of  power 
locked  in  their  inner  being.  In  fact  all  are  millionaires, 
but  their  priceless  treasures  will  remain  useless  to  them, 
till  some  one  informs  them  of  their  own  possessions  and 
hands  them  the  key  with  which  to  unlock  them. 

—E.  D.  BahUtt. 

Though  at  the  expense  again  of  repetition  I  add  here 
and  in  the  following  sections,  some  extracts  from 
my  "Mail  Course  in  The  Art  of  Living."  This  art  of 
controling  one's  self  which  we  call  "Voluntary  Concen- 
tration," is  not  merely  learning,  it  is  living;  and  to 
live  this  Principle  means  that  there  must  be  repetition, 
"line  upon  line"  till  the  thought  becomes  a  part  of  the 
whole  mental  man,  as  the  food  of  the  morning  has 
become  in  results,  part  of  the  physical  man.  In  as 
many  ways  as  possible,  I  am  repeating  the  simple  prin- 
ciple of  Human-control,  of  Self-control  through  Con- 
centration, which  is  only  control  through  Auto-Sngg*es- 
tion. 

I  wish  to  clear  from  your  mind  the  confusion  that 
exists  in  the  minds  of  many  students  along  New 
Thought  lines  as  to  the  meaning  and  the  use  of  this 
term  Concentration.  This  thought  take  with  you: — 
you  do  concentrate.  But  it  is  the  concentration  of 
habit,  a  habit  created  by  necessity.    All  successful  men 


98  CONCENTRATION: 

win  through  concentration,  but  it  is  a  concentration  that 
costs  them  the  pleasure  of  living.  Business  attention 
is  concentration.  Business  care  follows  them  home, 
absorbs  the  domestic  virtues.  It  follows  them  to  church 
and  deadens  the  sound  of  sermon  and  hymn.  It  follows 
to  theater,  and  obstructs  the  view  of  stage.  It  follows 
to  bed  and  prevents  sleep.  This  is  concentration. 
Through  habit,  it  has  become  involuntary.  When  any 
concentration  becomes  wearisome,  when  we  wish  it 
would  leave  us,  it  has  then  become  unwholesome. 
Thoughts  connected  with  limitations  will  so  become. 
Any  thought  limited  to  the  external,  when  held  long, 
will  cause  weariness  of  the  flesh.  Business  men,  pro- 
fessional men,  are  prone  to  let  their  thought  born  of 
necessity  rule  them.  Success  in  any  sense  cannot  be 
his  v^rho  does  not  rule  himself,  that  is,  does  not  choose 
his  thoughts.  Involuntary  concentration  is  slavery,  is 
disease  and  death. 

Voluntary  concentration  is  mastery,  is  health.  Con- 
centration upon  a  thought  you  chose  and  then  lay- 
ing it  aside  and  taking  up  another,  is  Self- Con- 
trol, is  POWER.  Concentration  is  only  Paying 
Attention  to  a  Chosen  Thought,  paying  Attention 
to  the  thought  you  have  chosen  for  the  time.  To  illu- 
strate:— A  procession  passes  the  window.  I  see  it,  but 
pay  no  particular  attention  to  any  one  person.  Some- 
thing attracts  my  attention  and,  to  that  particular  thing 
or  person,  I  direct  my  attention  and  I  see  only  that. 
My  attention  is  concentrated  upon  that  and  it  absorbs 
my  whole  thought.  I  know,  however,  that  the  proces- 
sion is  passing.  I  may  later  recall  much  that  passed. 
That  is  a  secondary  attention.  All  that  passes  before 
the  eye  is  photographed  upon  the  psychic  sense,  so  that, 
while  the  conscious  mind  is  paying  attention  to  one 
person,  the  sub-conscious  is  paying  attention  to  all  that 
is  present.  To  concentrate,  is  to  let  the  conscious  will 
hold  to  the  one  thought  out  of  the  procession  of  thoughts 
that  are   all  the  time  passing  in  the  mind.      Other 


—THE  ROAD  TO  SUCCESS.  99 

thoughts  will  be  there.  It  is  impossible  to  make  the 
mind  a  blank,  but  it  is  possible  to  notice  only  that  which 
you  choose  of  what  passes  through  it.  It  is  possible 
to  choose  a  thought  and  to  so  hold  it  before  conscious- 
ness that  no  other  is  present  with  us.  This  is  the  case 
in  all  excitement.  Fear  is  concentration  upon  the 
thought  of  fear ;  pain^  upon  the  thought  of  pain ;  grief, 
upon  grief;  worry,  upon  something  that  causes  intense 
anxiety.  What  the  man  does  thus  instinctively,  he  can 
do  under  intelligent  direction.  In  learning  concentra- 
tion, you  are  learning  to  supplant  instinct  by  self- 
control.  Instinct  is  control  by  the  Absolute,  by  race- 
thought.  Concentration,  as  w^e  now  use  it.  is  control 
of  the  manifestation  of  life  by  the  Individual  will.  To 
attain  this  control,  it  is  first  necessary  to  believe  it  pos- 
sible. Where  this  belief  is,  next  is  the  declaration  that 
you  will  learn  it.  Having  so  determined,  you  can  de- 
velop it.  "Where  there  is  a  will,  there  is  a  way.^^  When 
you  determine  to  so  develop,  you  will  make  effort,  you 
will  do.  Effort  requires  time.  These  steps  and  inter- 
mediary ones  you  will  follow.  Failures  come  from 
wishes  jtemporary  likes,  but  never  fro  mreal  desires. 
Do  you  desire  it?  Then  you  will  make  effort  and  will 
win.  If  you  only  wish,  the  desire  for  something  else 
will  overshadow  your  wish.  Convert  a  mere  wish  into 
a  desire  and  LET  the  Desire  take  possession  of  you 
and  lead  you  to  its  own  expression.  Put  no  conscious 
effort  upon  any  desire.  Hold  to  it  in  faith  and  it  will 
manifest.  The  danger  is  that  you  will  try  too  hard. 
The  chief  thing  that  causes  failure  in  all  psychic  at- 
tempts is  that  the  person  tries  too  hard.  You  are  ever 
to  remember  that  you  are  to  LET  the  Current  have  its 
way  through  you.  You  can  guide  it  by  your  Affirma- 
tion, but  you  are  to  know  that  it  will  run  in  the  channel 
of  Suggestion  without  effort  on  your  part.  Negative 
to  the  Soul,  positive  to  all  externals,  is  the  law.  "Trust 
the  current  that  knows  its  way,"  is  Emerson's  direction. 
"Thy  will  be  done,"  is  Jesus'.  "Float  with  hand  on 
helm,"  is  my  direction.    "TRUST;'  is  the  word. 


100  CONCENTRATION : 


SECTION  XIX. 


SOME  PRACTICAL  SUGGESTIONS. 


We   may   question   with  wand   of  science 

Explain,  decide,  discuss, 
But  only  in  Meditation, 
The  Mystery  speaks  to  us. 

— John  Boyle  O'Reiley. 
He  always  wins  who  sides  with  God. 

To  him  no  chance  is  lost. 
God's  will  is   sweetest  to  him   when 
It  triumphs  at  his  cost. 

— Old  Hymn. 
Into  that  realm  of  reverie  where  the  soul  feeds  on  immortal 
fruits    and    communes    with    unseen    associates,    the    body 
meanwhile  being  left  to  the  semblance  of  idleness — of  all 
which,  the  man  have  given  this  valid  justification:  — 
"I  loaf  and  Invite  my  soul. 

I  lean  and  loaf  at  my  ease  observing  a  spear  of  summer 
grass." 

— Moses  Colt  Tyler.     (Life  of  Patrick  Henry.) 

Affirmations  are  power  and  used  in  any  manner  are 
to  be  recommended.  Used  till  one  forgets  to  use  them, 
by  no  longer  needing  them.  The  Affirmation  serving 
to  create  the  mental  habit  of  looking  at  affairs,  condi- 
tions and  experiences  of  life,  from  the  point  of  view  of 
the  Affirmation. 

But  Oral  Affirmations  have  great  power  and  in  begin- 
ning to  obtain  the  self-control  that  comes  from  Con- 
centration it  is  often  wise  to  suggest  aloud  to  yourself 
until  you  shall  have  grown  the  power  of  Silent-Sugges- 
tion. And  even  after  you  have  attained  considerable 
attainment  in  this  silent  power  you  will  find  great  help, 
when  new  conditions  domancling  new  Affirmations  arise, 
by  speaking  the  words  to  yourself.  The  spoken  word 
has  a  power  in  affecting  the  nervous  system  that  the 


—THE  ROAD  TO  SUCCESS.  101 

silent  word  has  not.  The  gray  matter  of  the  brain  and 
nerves^  vibrates  with  the  spoken  word,  as  the  violin 
string  does  to  the  stroke  of  the  bow,  and  each  vibra- 
tion helps  to  make  the  cells  responsive  to  the  thought 
the  words  convey.  It  is  wise  to  take  possession  of  every 
factor  that  will  help  us  in  the  development  of  Mastery. 
In  the  beginning  of  my  study  thirty  years  ago,  I  would 
repeat  the  chosen  words  till  I  became  unconscious. 
Tennyson  says  he  went  into  a  trance  through  repeating 
and  concentrating  upon  his  own  name.  You  choose 
an  Affirmation  in  line  with  some  desire.  Talk  to  your- 
self in  line  of  that  desire.  Place  yourself,  in  imagina- 
tion, in  a  chair  opposite  yourself  and  talk  to  yourself. 
In  imagination,  see  yourself  there.  If  you  are  in  the 
habit  of  doubting  your  abiUty  in  any  line,  tell  your 
SELF  that  you  have  power,  that  you  are  a  son  of  God, 
that  you  can  do  anything.  Keep  at  it  till  you  begin  to 
fill  up  with  power,  till  you  feel  as  if  you  had  taken 
stimulant,  till  the  brain  Joegins  to  reel.  Let  it  reel  till 
you  fall  to  chair,  lounge  or  floor  unconscious  and  lie 
there  till  you  awaken,  saying,  "I  have  won !  I 
have  won  V 

Take  a  case  of  absent  treatment!  You  wish  to  heal. 
Go  into  a  room  by  yourself.  Sit  down  by  lounge, 
couch  or  bed.  Imagine  the  patient  there.  See  him,  or 
her,  lying  there  before  you.  Imagination  is  the  CRE- 
ATIVE faculty.  Develop  this  power  till  you  can  FEEL 
that  he  is  there.  Then  talk  to  him  as  IF  he  was  there. 
He  IS  there  when  you  SEE  him  there,  for  there  is  no 
space  to  thought.  In  this  way,  you  can  heal  or  help  in 
any  desired  way.  Learn  to  so  concentrate  upon  this 
patient  that  you  are  oblivious  of  everything  else. 
Imagine  him  well.  He  is  well.  Spirit  knows  no  sick- 
ness. You  are  to  see  the  spirit  well  and  full  of  life. 
Tell  him  so.  You  will,  in  this  way,  learn  to  concentrate 
when  you  desire.  A  lady  once  came  to  me  for  treatment 
of  her  daughter.  I  agreed  and,  when  the  mother  left, 
I   sat   down   by   my  treating   lounge.      I   brought   the 


102  CONCENTRATION: 

daughter  there  in  imagination  and  made  passes  with  my 
hands  from  head  to  foot,  just  as  if  she  was  there  in 
body.  Then  I  said :  "Go  to  sleep  and  sleep  till  3  p.  m., 
when  you  will  awaken  with  all  these  conditions  passed 
entirely  away."     She  did  so  awaken. 

Suppose  it  is  a  case  of  business  dealing  with  a  man. 
Place  him  in  like  position.  Talk  to  him  as  if  he  were 
really  there.  You  will  grow  to  think  it  without  talking. 
This  is  concentration.  It  need  not  take  you  an  instant 
to  concentrate  to  give  the  thought  power  over  yourself 
or  to  send  it  telepathically  to  others. 

Absent-mindedness  is  involuntary  concentration.  Cul- 
tivate that  condition  so  that  you  can  enter  it  at  will. 
Let  it  be  voluntary  concentration.  Choose  some  theme 
and  speak  upon  it  when  alone.  Grow  into  the  habit  of 
losing  yourself  in  thought  and  recalling  yourself  at 
will. 

When  you  wish  to  know  anything,  tell  yourself  that  you 
know  and  let  it  come  to  you  as  you  let  go  of  the  con- 
scious thought.  An  illustration: — I  had  an  article  to 
write  to-day.  Before  I  was  fairly  awake,  it  thought 
itself  through  my  mind.  After  I  dressed,  I  tried  to 
recall  it.  The  title  included  three  subjects.  I  could 
not  recall  the  last.  The  more  I  tried,  the  more  it 
eluded  me.  At  last,  I  gave  up  and  said:  "Well,  if 
it  is  necessary,  it  will  come."  Later  in  the  day,  while 
I  was  dictating  a  letter,  my  thouo-ht  ran  in  the  same 
channel  and  took  up  the  theme  I  had  forgotten  and 
followed  it  to  the  end.  I  let  it  run  itself.  This  is  con- 
centration. Suppose  you  have  a  patient  and  you  are 
puzzled  as  to  what  to  do.  You  have  studied  the  case 
and  are  undecided.  By  this  study,  you  have  given  your- 
self an  auto-suggestion  born  of  desire.  Now  say,  "Well, 
when  the  right  time  comes,  I  shall  know,"  and  forget 
all  about  it.  It  will  suddenly  dawn  \\\)0\\  you  from  the 
sub-conscious.  This  suggestion  and  this  forgelfulness 
IS  concentration 


—THE  ROAD  TO  SUCCESS.  103 

Suppose  it  is  a  thought  of  business.  You  have  con- 
sidered the  question  and  are  unable  to  decide.  Tell 
yourself  that,  at  the  right  time,  it  will  be  clear  to  you. 
It  will  come  when  you  let  go  of  it.  "My  word  shall 
not  return  unto  me  void  V  How  shall  it  return  if  you 
do  not  let  it  go?  It  goes  from  you  when  you  forget  it 
once  uttered  in  faith.  Thus  are  you  learning  concen- 
tration. 

You  wish  to  go  voluntarily  into  the  sub-conscious.  Do 
the  same.  Tell  yourself  what  you  wish.  Sit  down  and 
let  that  wish  be  the  controller  of  the  hour.  Give  up! 
Forget  that  you  have  made  the  wish.  Forget  that  you 
have  the  desire  or  that  you  have  given  the  direction. 
Let  your  thoughts  take,  without  your  conscious  direc- 
tion, the  line  you  have  previously  desired.  Practice 
alone  will  bring  the  power  to  do  this. 
By  a  systematic  application  of  the  above,  you  will  grow 
into  a  conscious  control  of  your  thought,  as  you  have 
heretofore,  through  necessity,  grown  into  an  involuntary 
control.  You  can  readily  concentrate,  when  compelled, 
in  your  business.  Affirm  that  it  is  easy  to  concentrate 
at  will  and  DO  it.  LET  the  thought  have  full  sway 
over  you.  I  know  of  no  other  way  to  accompHsh  this 
but  this:  Pay  Attention  to  a  chosen  thovght.  It  is  a 
good  plan  to  practice  self-suggestion  in  goiag  to  sleep. 
Tell  yourself  you  are  sleepy  and  go  to  sleep  on  Sugges- 
tion. Tell  yourself  you  feel  like  yawning  and  let  it 
yawn.  Tell  yourself  that  you  are  hungry  and  let  the 
hunger  come.  Tell  yourself  that  you  wish  some  food 
and  suggest  the  kind  and  let  hunger  for  it  come.  Tell 
yourself  that  you  wish  to  go,  or  to  do  something,  and  let 
the  desire  grow  and  obey.  In  this  way,  you  get  into 
the  habit  of  living  from  the  sub-conscious  by  self -direc- 
tion and  are  "in  the  Silence"  all  the  time.  Concentra- 
tion is  not  a  thing  for  special  occasions;  it  is  for  all 
times.  When  you  have  learned  to  "let  the  current  have 
its  way,"  you  have  learned  the  greatest  lesson  of  Ufe. 
You  will  live  above  sense,  will  live  subject  at  all  times 


104  CONCENTRATION : 

to  the  Spirit;  will  be  led  by  intuition;  will  use  your 
reason  to  apply  Truth  which  flows  into  the  conscious- 
ness by  intuition  to  the  objective  life.  Concentration,  "in 
the  Silence,"  is  not  a  thing  for  special  occasions;  it  is 
the  condition  of  the  devotee  made  constant.  "Pray 
without  ceasing,"  is  the  law.  Desire,  suggest  and  let. 
That  is  all.  It  is  the  lesson  Jesus  learned  when  he  said : 
"Thy  will  be  done."  "May  thy  kingdom  come,"  really 
means,  "Let  thy  kingdom  come."  The  kingdom  of  self- 
control  !  The  kingdom  of  self-mastery !  Concentra- 
tion is  the  shutting  out  of  the  objective  life.  It  is 
closing  the  five  senses  and  letting  the  Soul  he  felt  and 
heard  in  the  silence. 

Follow  these  directions.  Practice  as  suggested  and  the 
Silence  will  become  vocal. 


The  exercise  of  the  Will,  or  the  lesson  of  power,  is  taught 
in  every  event.  From  the  child's  successive  possession  ol 
his  several  senses,  up  to  the  hour  when  he  says  "Thy 
will  be  done!"  he  is  learning  the  secret  that  he  can  reduce 
under  his  will,  not  only  particular  events,  but  great  classes, 
nay,  whole  series  of  events,  and  so  conform  all  facts  to 
his  character.  Nature  is  thoroughly  mediative.  It  is  made 
to  serve.  It  receives  the  dominion  of  man  as  meekly  as 
the  ass  on  which  the  Savior  rode.  It  offers  all  its  kingdoms 
to  man  in  the  raw  material  which  he  may  mould  into  what 
is  useful.  Man  is  never  weary  of  working  it  up.  He  forges 
the  subtle  and  delicate  air  into  wise  and  melodious  words 
and  gives  them  wings  as  angels  of  persuasion  and  com- 
mand. One  after  another  his  victorious  thought  comes  up 
with  and  reduces  all  things,  until  the  world  becomes  at 
last  only  a  realized  will, — the  double  of  man. 

— Emerson  in   ''Nature.'' 


—THE  ROAD  TO  SUCCESS.  105 


SECTION  XX. 


SELF-STUDY  AND  THE  LAW  OF  LIFE. 

Buddha  appealed  himself  only  to  what  we  should  call  the 
Inner  Light. 

— Max  Muller. 

Do  your  work,  respecting  the  excellence  of  the  work,  and 
not  its  acceptableness.  This  is  so  much  economy  as  that, 
rightly  read,  it  is  the  sum  of  economy.  Profligacy  consists 
not  so  much  in  spending  years  of  your  time  or  chests  of 
money, — but  in  spending  them  off  the  line  of  your  career. 
The  crime  which  bankrupts  men  and  states  is  job-work; 
declining  from  your  main  design,  to  serve  a  turn  here  and 
there.  Nothing  is  beneath  you,  if  it  is  in  the  direction  of 
your  life;  nothing  is  great  or  desirable  if  it  is  off  from  that. 
— Emerson  in  ''Conduct  of  Life." 

It  is'  well  to  have  some  definite  methods  for  practice  in 
the  beginning  but  there  is  a  danger  that  I  warn  you  of, 
and  that  is  that  you  will  grow  to  consider  them  a  neces- 
sity.   Beware  of  this. 

Use  them  for  self-development.  Eemember  that  you 
will  soon  outgrow  them.  I  give  them  to  be  outgrown. 
But  use  them  until  you  can  concentrate  without  these 
preliminary  steps. 

First — Study  yourself.  Understand  your  own  mental 
conditions.  See  where  you  are  positive  and  where  nega- 
tive in  your  thought.  All  thoughts  of  any  lack  in  your- 
self;  all  thoughts  of  want;  all  tendencies  to  complain, 
wish,  or  find  fault  with  yourself;  all  criticisms,  regrets 
and  self  condemnation;  all  thoughts  of  inability  to 
cope  with  any  condition;  all  thoughts  of  shrinking, 
avoiding,  fearing  any  person,  thing  or  condition;  all 
thoughts  of  reliance  upon  friends,  money,  position,  rep- 
utation or  culture;  all  thoughts  of  any  assistance  from 
without  yourself;  all  these  are  thoughts  of  weakness. 


106  CONCENTRATION: 

They  have  no  drawing  power.  They  are  non-attractive; 
produce  mental  conditions  that  are  a  lack  of  what  is 
called  "personal  magnetism,"  bnt  which  is  only  a  lack 
of  those  character-radiations  that  create  success. 
Study  yourself  and  see  how  much  you  concentrate  upon 
such  thoughts.  Realize  how  much  they  influence  your 
life;  how  much  time  you  waste  in  thinking  them  over 
and  over;  how  much  you  diffuse  power  in  this  worry, 
fear,  fret  and  complaint.  This  is  riding  the  hobby 
horse  of  childhood,  ride  all  day  and  you  are  not  an  inch 
further  on  your  way.  This  method  of  using  thought 
is  but  mental  gum-chewing;  disgusting  to  the  observer 
and  destructive  of  all  healthful  mental  digestion. 
Where  you  learn  that  you  have  been  holding  a  thought 
of  these  kinds,  immediately  change  to  its  opposite. 
Study  the  tables  on  pages  36  and  37  in  "Self -Healing" 
and  concentrate  upon  the  opposite  thought. 
If  you  have  held  thoughts  of  failure,  of  want,  change 
them  at  once  to  thoughts  of  possession.  Never  think 
want!  Never  wish  for  anything,  for  you,  as  Spirit, 
possess  all  in  potentiality,  as  the  egg  possesses  all  the 
songs  the  bird  shall  sing.  Turn  your  attention  to  this 
germ  within,  and  claim  possession,  and  in  concentration 
give  it  an  opportunity  for  expression.  Concentration 
is  mental  incubation.  Brood  over  the  desire  as  a  pres- 
ent reality,  as  the  mother  bird  broods  over  the  ^gg.  She 
knows  by  instinct  that  the  chick  is  there  and  by  brooding 
she  brings  it  into  expression.  In  the  faith  of  reason 
and  instinct  which  you  possess,  brood  over  that  which 
you  know  is,  and  which  you,  by  Affirmation,  have  called 
forth,  until  you  see  it  with  eye  and  touch  it  with  hand. 
Take  what  Lowell  says  of  this  bird-condition  as  your 
own,  and  sing: 

His  mate  feels  the  eggs  beneath  her  wings 
And  the  heart  in  her  dumb  breast  flutters  and  sings. 
He  sings  to  the  wide  world,  and  she  to  her  nest, — 
In  the  nice  ear  of  Nature,  which  song  is  the  best? 

For  this  reason  whenever  you  are  inclined  to  say  "I 


—THE  ROAD  TO  SUCCESS.  107 

want!^'  think — "I  possess  !^^  and  seek,  and  yon  shall 
find  it  within.     Then  let  it  out. 

Feel  that  yon  thus  have ;  others  then  will  feel  the  same, 
for  you  will  radiate  those  vibrations  of  power  that  cause 
them  to  feel,  to  believe  in  you,  and  to  act  under  those 
feelings.  This  is  "Personal  magnetism,"  and  it  is  but 
the  concentrated  rays  of  the  whole  man  turned  to  one 
purpose  through  concentrating  upon  one  thought.  And 
thought  is  the  directing  power  of  all  Life's  vibrations. 
As  I  think,  so  my  radiations  are.  When  I  think  dif- 
fusively my  radiations  are  diffusive,  and  people  do  not 
feel,  do  not  recognize  me.  I  make  them  feel  by  shooting 
my  vibrations  from  the  chamber  of  Concentration. 
Then  the  projectile  is  felt.  Otherwise  the  powder 
flashes  in  the  universal,  and  the  projectile  lies  in  the 
magazine  of  the  soul. 

Feel,  and  you  make  others  feel.  This  is  the  law.  Be 
a  dynamo  and  the  currents  will  flow.  Feeling  is  the 
power  which  thought  direscts.  Therefore  cultivate  the 
power  to  feel.  Enthusiasm  is  its  name  in  conduct.  Be 
enthusiastic.  This  can  all  be  done  in  silence.  But 
FEEL  enthusiastic  when  you  are  in  silence,  and  then 
Power,  concentrated  Power,  will  go  on  the  line,  over  the 
wires  of  your  thought,  to  create  success.  "Mean  busi- 
ness !"  and  feel  business  when  you  think. 
This  power  to  feel,  this  feeling  of  power,  this  sense  of 
possession,  characterizes  all  great  characters  of  history. 
We  credit  it  to  personal  magnetism.  But  it  is  char- 
acter. Emerson  says  of  certain  great  men  in  his  essay 
upon  "Character,"  "The  larger  part  of  their  power  was 
latent.  This  is  character — a  reserved  force  which  acts 
directly  by  presence  and  without  means !"  This  reserve 
force  creates  success,  wherever  success  is  found.  There- 
fore will  you  succeed,  create  this  reserve  power.  It 
is  done  by  concentration,  by  patience,  by  entering  the 
Silence  with  the  consciousness  of  possession  and  there 
letting  your  whole  personality  be  fllled.  "Blessed  are 
they  who  hunger  and  thirst  after  righteousness  for  tliey 


108  CONCENTRATION : 

shall  he  filled T  is  the  promise.  Enter  the  silence  of 
meditation  with  sincere  desire^  with  "an  earnest  and 
contrite  heart/^  and  you  shall  be  filled  with  power  to 
bring  into  manifestation  that  which  you  have  in  silence 
affirmed. 

Here  is  the  Law  as  laid  down  in  my  first  book  "How 
to  Control  Fate  through  Suggestion/'  and  time  has 
enabled  me  only  to  enter  into  a  deeper  realization  that 
it  is  the  one  and  only  Law  of  Success. 
Build  for  yourself  a  'perfect  Ideal!  Thinh  from  that 
Ideal  as  a  present  reality!  Affirm  that  Ideal  a  present 
reality!  Suggest  from  that  Ideal  as  a  present  reality! 
Act  from  that  Ideal  as  a  present  reality!  And  it  he- 
comes  to  you  a  present  reality. 

It  may  be  briefly  stated  thus: — Thinlc,  spealc  and  act 
just  as  you  wish  to  be,  and  you  will  be  that  ivhich  you 
wish  to  be. 

Those  who  thus  think  become  that  which  they  think, 
because  the  Law  of  Life  is:7  am  that  which  I  thinlc. 
To  think  is  to  be !  Destroy  my  thinking  power  and  I 
am  destro3^ed.  Therefore  the  only  thing  I  have  to  do 
to  control  my  life  is  to  control  my  thoughts  and  think — 
Control !  Concentrate  upon  the  thought  of  Self -Mast- 
ery. Self-control  is  the  keystone  of  character.  Faith 
in  Self  the  source  of  personal  magnetism;  the  source 
of  power;  the  source  of  success.  Therefore  the  first 
thing  to  cultivate  is  faith  in  Self.  Affirmation  to 
use: — I  believe  in  myself  as  the  source  of  Truth  Love, 
Wisdom  and  Poiver.  Concentrate  upon  this  thought 
and  then  "look  within.'' 

Read  Emerson's  "Self-Reliance"  and  commit  to  mem- 
ory the  passage  commencing,  "Trust  thyself!  Every 
heart  beats  in  unison  with  that  iron  string !"  Also  mem- 
orize and  use  this  quatrain  of  Mrs.  Helen  Wilman's: — 
He  who  dares  assert  the  I, 

May  calmly  wait, 

While  hurrying  Fate 
Meets  his  demands  with  sure  supply ! 


-THE  ROAD  TO  SUCCESS.  109 


SECTION  XXI. 


SPECIAL  DESIRES  VS.  PRINCIPLE. 

God  alone  can  make  the  work  complete, 
Give  to  Cause  its  perfect  ending. 

— The  Kalevalla. 

An  honest  heart,  O  Helga,  of  pure  endeavor 
With   Odin's  runes  is  written,  misleading  never! 

— Fridthjofs  Saga. 
The  power  of  man  increases  by  continuing  steady  in  one 
direction. 

— Emerson. 

One  question  that  frequently  comes  to  me  in  various 
forms  concerns  the  act  of  concentrating  upon  special 
desires  for  some  certain  condition  or  thing. 
These  questions  will  illustrate,  and  are  each  from  either 
recent  letter  or  interviews: 

1.  "I  wish  supply;  shall  I  concentrate  upon  a  specified 
sum  ?" 

2.  "I  wish  a  companion;  shall  I  center  my  thought 
upon  any  particular  person  ?'' 

3.  "I  wish  to  win  a  prize  in  a  lottery.     How  shall  I 
concentrate  ?" 

4.  "I  am  a  school  girl ;  I  wish  to  stand  well  in  my  class. 
How  shall  I  think  that  I  may  win  ?" 

5.  "I  wish  our  foot-ball  team  to  win.     How  shall  I 
use  Mental  Science?" 

6.  "I  wish  a  certain  present.     Is  it  right  for  me  to 
concentrate  upon  it?'' 

7.  "I   wish   relief   from   rheumatism.      How   shall   I 
affirm?" 

8.  "I  am  unhappy  with  my  wife.    Shall  I  demand  that 
she  become  harmonious?" 

9.  "My  son  smokes  cigarettes.    How  shall  I  suggest 
that  I  may  break  him  of  the  habit? 


110  CONCENTRATION: 

First  let  us  understand  what  has  already  been  said — 
Build  your  Ideal  from  Princiyle  and  not  from  details. 
The  ideal,  after  we  have  built  it,  becomes  the  objective 
actual. 

The  Ideal  should  be  permanent;  if  built  of  details  it 
must  continually  change.  Principles  alone  are  eternal. 
Then  for  us  there  is  this  choice: — 
Either  to  assume  that  we  know  Just  what  conditions  and 
things  are  best  for  us  and  then  concentrate  upon  these ; 
or  to  assume  that  we  are  expressions  of  Intelligence  that 
knows  better  than  v^e,  in  our  partial  unfoldment,  can 
know,  and  trust  that  IntelHgence  to  bring  that  which 
best  satisfies  our  desire. 

Assuming  the  first  position  we  shall  decide  just  what 
we  want  and  concentrate  upon  that  and  draw  it.  Be 
it  money,  we  shall  fix  upon  a  certain  sum ;  be  it  friend, 
upon  a  certain  person;  be  it  environment,  we  shall  fix 
upon  a  certain  locality ;  be  it  fame,  upon  a  certain  prize, 
and  by  constant  expectation,  affirmation  and  concentra- 
tion win  that  we  have  chosen. 

But  every  person  has  learned  that  he,  or  she,  has  not 
correctly  measured  the  value  of  things  thus  coveted  and 
won.  There  is  still  a  lack.  Things  do  not  satisfy. 
''Things  shall  be  added,"  said  Jesus,  when  in  Principle 
you  gain  the  Power. 

For  this  reason  I  advise  you  to  assume  the  position, 
that  the  sub-conscious  Wisdom  knows  better  than  you 
know  in  the  conscious  mind,  what  is  needed  for  your 
unfoldment,  and  consequent  happiness,  and  to  trust 
that  sub-conscious  Wisdom  to  direct  you  to,  or  to  draw 
to  you,  what  is  best,  to  satisfy  yonr  Ideal. 
By  desire,  give  the  Auto- Suggestion  to  Soul  as  to  what 
you  wish  in  Principle,  will  it  only,  and  tlien  let  that 
Suggestion  in  the  Soul  bring  about  conditions  and 
things  to  the  objective  man. 

You  know  but  few  of  the  million  factors  that  are  shap- 
ing your  destiny  and  cannot  possibly  judge  what  con- 


—THE  ROAD  TO  SUCCESS.  Ill 

ditions  will  arise  to-moroow  or  next  year.  Therefore 
you  cannot  wisely  ask  for  things,  lest  they  be  not  those 
which  fits  to-morrow's  needs.  Besides,  from  every  point 
of  the  great  circle  of  Infinity,  and  from  the  Infinite 
Supply,  your  needs  can  be  met.  To  concentrate  upon 
any  one  point  is  to  close  all  others  to  you.  To  con- 
centrate upon  any  one  thing,  is  to  keep  all  other  things 
that  might  come,  away;  to  concentrate  upon  any  particu- 
lar time  is  to  close  other  and  perhaps  more  fitting  oc- 
casions. 

With  the  when,  where  and  how,  I  advise  you  not  to 
deal.  Deal  with  the  fact  that  in  the  Ail-Embracing 
Good; — in  Infinite  Supply, — everything  necessary  for 
your  Health,  Happiness,  and  Prosperity  already  is,  and 
all  you  need  to  do  is  to  suggest  to  this  All-Power 
through  your  sub-conscious  life,  and  then  to  let  that 
which  you  ask  for  come  at  the  right  time.  This  is  the 
truth  in  the  words  of  Jesus: — "When  ye  pray  believe 
that  ye  have  received  them,  and  ye  shall  have  them.'^ 

This  leaves  you  free  to  receive,  and  leaves  the  Power 
that  supplies  you  limitless.  Any  concentration  upon  a 
particular  thing  limits  the  Power  you  ask  to  bring  it, 
to  that  one  thing.  Be  limitless  in  your  faith  and  know 
that  Supply  is  limitless. 

In  light  of  this  Principle  I  will  briefly  answer  the  above 
questions,  ref ering  to  them  by  number : 

1.  Concentrate  upon  all  you  need,  upon  sufficiency. 
Use  no  specified  amount  and  know  that  what  you  need 
will  come  as  you  need. 

2.  Know  that  in  Infinite  Supply  the  companion  you 
need  already  is,  and  that  your  call  will  reach  him  (or 
her)  and  that  he  will  come  to  you  at  the  right  time.  Any 
particular  person  among  your  acquaintances  is  more 
likely  not  to  be,  than  to  be,  the  one  fitted  for  you.  With 
Miss  Philura  in  the  story,  feel  assured  that  he  is  in  the 
All-Embracing  Good,  and  will  come  at  the  right  time. 


112  CONCENTRATION: 

Make  ready  for  him  in  mind  and  environment.  He 
will  come. 

3.  I  would  affirm — If  it  is  for  my  good,  I  shall  draw 
a  prize, — and  think  no  more  about  it.  I  know"  two 
cases  where  such  prizes  have  broken  up  homes  and 
ruined  characters. 

4.  Make  your  desire  into  the  Suggestion — I  have  won 
the  test  place  for  me, — and  then  work  conscientiously 
and  sincerely,  without  anxiety  or  worry.  Care  for 
health;  and  above  all  seek  the  place  with  the  noble 
motive  of  self  unfoldment  i'l  wisdom  and  power,  and 
banish  all  thought  of  comperition  and  of  envy. 

5.  Make  in  your  mind  the  picture  of  success  of  your 
team  without  any  feeling  of  rejoicing  over  the 
vanquished,  and  willing  to  accept  the  gage  of  battle, 
let  the  Omnipotent  that  w^orks  through  both  teams, 
settle  the  matter,  and  rejoice  whatever  may  be  the  result. 
Your  thought  can  control  your  life,  but  not  the  life 
and  the  expression  of  others ;  your  attitude  can  be  that 
of  success,  no  matter  which  wins;  when  one  has  done 
his  best,  that  is  Success. 

6.  It  is  your  privilege  to  do  as  you  choose  and  if 
conscience  says  to  you  it  is  right — it  is  right.  The 
question  is — Is  it  best  for  me  so  to  concentrate?  No! 
for  it  is  pure  selfishness,  and  selfishness  never-  brings 
happiness.  The  best  Affirmation  is — If  it  is  best  for 
me  a  present  will  come. 

7.  In  faith  in  the  Divine  Life  within  you,  concentrate 
upon  the  mental  picture  of  Health.  Affirm: — Life  is 
abundant  I  I  have  my  share.  The  Omnipotent  Life  is 
within  me  and  I  am  healed!  Banish  all  thought  of 
symptoms  from  your  mind.  Recognize  only  Life  and 
its  healthful  manifestations. 

8.  No!  give  her  liberty;  the  same  liberty  you  demand 
for  yourself.  Make  yourself  harmonious.  Eadiate  joy 
and  gladness.    Fill  the  home  with  your  healthful  love- 


—THE  ROAD  TO  SUCCESS.  113 

vibrations  and  then,  if  she  is  not  herself  happy,  you 
will  be.  Your  happiness  does  not  depend  upon  her, 
or  upon  any  person.  It  depends  entirely  upon  your 
own  mental  state,  and  you  can  make  that  what  you  will. 
You  have  power  of  choice.  Affirm — I  depend  on  no 
person  or  condition.  I  am  happy  hecause  I  choose  to 
he  happy!  and  home  atmosphere  will  change. 

9.  In  your  mind  free  him  from  the  habit  and  give 
him  Hberty.  If  you  depend  upon  the  Power  of  Thought 
to  cure  him,  never  chide  nor  call  attention  to  the  habit. 
Suggest  to  him  from  the  Ideal  you  hold  for  him.  Con- 
centrate upon  this  mental  picture  of  freedom  and  all 
your  conduct  and  speech  will  be  from  that.  "I  am  glad 
to  notice  that  you  are  out-growing  the  habit,"  is  a 
wise  Suggestion. 

From  the  Principle  from  which  these  answers  arise 
each  person  can  for  himself  get  a  solution  to  his  prob- 
lems. The  Principle  never  fails.  Trust  it !  Think 
from  it !  Affirm  from  it !  Suggest  from  it !  You  thus 
become  that  which  you  think. 

The  principal  factor  in  Self-Mastery  through  Concen- 
tration, is  the  formation  of  a  mental  picture  of  that 
which  is  desired.  Mental  imagery  is  the  one  creative 
power  of  man.  Make  this  picture  and  then,  despite  all 
seeming  evil,  amid  all  discouragement,  cling  to  it  as 
to  an  objective  reality  and  you  make  conditions  for  it  to 
become  that  reality. 

/  am  that  which  I  thinTc  I  am.  Because  I  made  the 
picture  and  the  sub-conscious  is  obliged  to  manifest  in 
the  form  I  made. 


114  CONCENTRATION: 


SECTION    XXII 


MY  ONE  EULE— AGEEEMENT. 

Resist  not  evil  but  overcome  evil  with  good. 

— Jesus. 
The  foolish  have  one  master,  that  is  fear. 

— Old  Proverb. 
If  you  wish  to  become  acquainted  with  Nature  you  must 
deal  with  her  sincerely. 

— Prof.  Tyndall. 
How  can  we  secure  concentration?     To  this  question,  the 
first  and  last  answer  must  be:      By  interest  and  strong 
motive.    The  stronger  the  motive,  the  greater  the  concen- 
tration. 

— Eustace  Miller,  M.  D. 

The  one  only  rule  I  give  my  pupils  is  this — NEYEE 
ANTAGONIZE.  Elaborate  this  and  it  becomes,  Never 
argue !  Never  contend !  Never  contradict !  Never 
oppose  !     Never  resist ! 

Eesistance  is  pain.  Antagonism  creates  those  condi- 
tions against  which  you  contend.  Opposition  but  in- 
creases the  evil.  Contradiction  breeds  ill  feeling.  Jesus 
has  the  law  thus : — "Agree  with  thine  adversary  quickly 
while  thou  art  in  the  way  with  him;  lest  at  any  time 
he  deliver  thee  to  the  judge  and  the  judge  deliver  thee 
to  officer,  and  thou  be  cast  into  prison  V  Agree !  don^t 
resist,  lest  it  become  worse  with  thee.  Eesistance  will 
bring  an  increased  penalty. 

Eesistance  is  concentration  upon  that  which  you  do  not 
want.  But  since  concentration  brings  into  expression 
that  upon  which  thought  is  concentrated  any  resistance 
brings  to  you  that  which  you  resist. 
This  is  a  negative  and  weak  condition.  Antagonism  is 
weakness.  Eesistance  is  negative.  You  are  influenced 
by  outside  suggestions.    Denials,  "Don'ts,"  are  negative. 


—THE  ROAD  TO  SUCCESS.  115 

They  leave  you  nothing  upon  which  to  rest.  AflBrma- 
tions  are  solid  foundations.  For  this  reason  say  "I 
like!^^  Tell  not  what  you  do  not  like.  Think  upon 
what  you  wish,  not  upon  what  you  do  not  wish,  for 
your  thought  is  creative. 

I  wish  you  to  think  upon  this  until  you  can  live  in  non- 
resistance,  by  ignoring  all  conditions  of  antagonism; 
by  so  concentrating  upon  the  thoughts  of  things  and 
conditions  desired,  that  you  will  recognize  no  excuse 
for  contention.  No  one  thing  in  all  Mental  Scienc  is 
harder  to  accomplish  than  this.  It  is  the  fulfillment 
of  the  law.  "Mind  your  own  business.^^  Bemember  the 
reply  of  Jesus  to  Peter  when  asked  by  him  what  John 
should  do :  "What  is  that  to  thee  ?  Follow  thou  me  V' 
Any  argument  or  antagonism,  is  minding  another's 
business.  All  persons  have  an  equal  right  with  yourself 
to  think  and  act  as  prompted  within.  In  giving  them 
this  right  in  your  thought,  you  cannot  resist  anything 
they  do.  You  will  think  and  act  your  thought  freely. 
And  since  Goodness,  Truth  and  Love,  are  realities  and 
are  all;  when  you  affirm  these  you  will  be  powerful. 
To  lack  faith  in  them  and  to  antagonize  renders  you  neg- 
ative and  weak.  You  have  separated  yourself  from 
Principle  which  is  power. 

Peter  resisted  and  lost  his  ear.  Jesus  did  not  resist 
and  was  crucified !  "Who  is  victor  ? — Pilate  or  Christ  ?" 
Eemember  the  motto  which  is  constantly  on  the  cover 
of  NOW: — "Nerve  us  with  incessant  Affirmatives. 
Don't  bark  against  the  bad;  but  chant  the  beauties  of 
the  good."  When  you  are  concentrated  in  "chanting" 
you  cannot  bark.  Which  shall  it  be?  Will  you  be  a 
growler,  or  a  chanter,  in  the  arena  of  life? 
So  important  is  this  attitude  and  yet  so  liable  to  be 
misunderstood  that  I  give  some  illustrations.  From 
them  you  may  learn  to  apply  the  law.  While  I  roomed 
in  Topeka,  Kansas,  there  was  placed  in  the  next  room, 
and  against  the  partition  wall,  a  house  organ ;  some  one 
would  practice  on  it  much  of  the  time.     At  first  it 


116  CONCENTRATION: 

distracted  my  attention  and  annoyed  me;,  till  suddenly 
it  dawned  upon  my  comprehension,  that  they  paid  rent 
for  that  room,  and  had  the  same  right  to  play  organ 
there,  as  I  had  to  play  on  my  typewriter;  that  if  I 
minded  my  business  and  became  concentrated  upon  it, 
I  would  not  be  listening  to  anything,  and  be  disturbed. 
Now,  whenever  I  am  asked  if  such  or  such  a  thing  does 
not  disturb  me  I  reply,  "I  do  not  allow  myself  to  be." 
A  friend  who  boarded  where  I  did,  was  annoyed  by  cats 
under  his  window  at  night.  Complaining  of  it  to  me, 
I  asked,  "What  are  you  going  to  do  about  it?"  He 
answered,  "I  have  done  everything  I  know!"  I  then 
asked,  "Do  you  think  the  cats  think  of  you?  Why  not 
treat  them  as  they  do  you?  They  probably  are  about 
their  business ;  you  attend  to  yours.  The  room  is  yours ; 
you  pay  rent  for  it  and  can  decide  what  shall  be  done 
in  it.  They  are  in  their  room,  why  not  let  them  do  as 
they  wish  in  it?  In  other  words,  why  not  let  them  at- 
tend to  their  business  while  you  mind  yours?  That  is, 
why  put  your  mind  upon  the  cats  and  allow  them  to 
trouble  you?  'None  so  deaf  as  those  who  will  not  hear.' 
By  antagonising  you  magnify  the  trouble  till  you  are 
loosing  sleep  and  will  soon  be  ill !  Concentrate  upon 
your  sleep  and  pay  no  attention  to  them."  After  a 
few  moments  silence  he  said :  "I  see !  I  will !"  He 
did  not  hear  them  thereafter. 

Complaining  of  the  weather,  a  friend  said:  "I  don't 
see  why  it  rains  so  much !"  "My  dear,"  I  said,  "will 
you  fight  a  battle  with  Omnipotence?  Are  you  setting 
yourself  up  as  the  superior  of  God  ?  Wliy  not  leave  his 
business  to  Him,  and  you  attend  to  your  own,  which 
is  to  use  the  weather  He  makes?"  "True!  Forgive 
me !  I  will  never  complain  again  1" 
"0,  this  headache !  I  dont  see  why  it  comes.  I  have 
been  fighting  it  all  day,  denying  it,  and  it  does  no 
good !"  pitifully  cried  a  patient.  "Well,  suppose  you 
now  in  love  agree  with  it.  Stop  fighting  and  begin  to 
love  the  Law  that  caused  it.     The  Universe  is  wise. 


—THE  ROAD  TO  SUCCESS.  117 

Cause  and  effect  are  divine.  Love  the  Law.  Agree 
with  it.  Denials  are  antagonism.  ^Agree  with  thine 
adversary!^  Be  passive  and  let  Love,  which  is  the 
fulfilling  of  the  law,  have  sway.  Affirm :  In  love  I  am 
healed r  Soon  peace  of  mind  and  relief  came  to  her. 
I  gave  this  law  of  non-resistance  one  evening  in  my 
class.  The  next  week  a  very  intelligent  and  pos- 
itive lady  said:  "I  tried  the  law  of  non-resist- 
ance in  my  case  and  it  works.  A  week  ago  Sunday 
morning  a  news-boy  got  under  my  window  at  five 
o'clock,  and  began  to  call  out  his  papers.  He  annoyed 
me  till  I  thought  how  I  would  shake  him  were  I  out 
there.  It  so  affected  me  that  I  got  no  more  sleep.  Yes- 
terday morning  he  began  again  at  the  same  time.  For 
a  moment  the  old  feeling  came  up.  Then  I  thought  of 
what  I  had  been  taught  and  I  said:  ^God  bless  the 
little  fellow,  he  is  attending  to  his  business.  How 
smart  he  is  to  be  out  so  early.  I  hope  he  will  sell  every 
paper!'  and  thinking  thus  I  fell  asleep.  I  felt  good 
all  day.'' 

^T  lost  some  money  from  my  pocket,"  said  a  student  of 
my  books.  "At  first  I  was  inclined  to  feel  badly  when 
the  thought  came,  ^What  is  your  business  now?  It 
was  your  business  to  put  a  guard  over  3^our  money; 
you  did  not.  Now  is  it  your  business  to  feel  badly 
and  lose  the  lesson,  or  is  it  your  business  to  so  learn 
that  you  may  lose  no  more?'  I  decided  I  would  not 
fight  the  inevitable,  but  rejoice  that  I  had  learned  all 
that  the  lesson  cost  me.'' 

Learn  from  these  how  easy  it  is  to  apply  the  Principle 
of  Agreement.     It  means   "Stop  fighting!"     Non-re- 
sistance !    Expression  of  faith  in  the  All  Good ! 
Eeconciliation  with  Divine  Will,  acceptance  of  present 
conditions  as  the  best  for  the  present.     They  are  to 
be  outgrown  in  love. 
"I  grateful  take  the  good  I  find. 
The  best  of  now  and  here." 


118  CONCENTRATION: 


SECTION  XXIII. 


LOVE. 

A  new  commandment  give  I  unto  you:  That  ye  love  one 
another. 

— Jesus. 
Now  abideth  these  three,  Faith,  Hope  and  Love,  but  the 
greatest  of  these  is  Love — Love  is  the  fullfilling  of  the  Law. 

— Paul. 
I  swear  I  begin  to  see  Love  with  sweeter  spasms  than  that 
which  responds  to  love.     It  is  that  which  contains  itself, 
which  never  invites  and  never  refuses. 

— Walt  Whitman. 

A  man  has  two  needs:  that  of  knowing  and  that  of  loving. 

— S.  Barring  Gould. 
The  lover  needs  no  law.  He'd  love  God  quite  as  well 
Were  there  no  heaven's  rewards;   no  punishment  of  hell. 

— Angelus  Silesiiis. 
The  verdict  of  this  world  is  short, 
Long  and  vigorous  its  report:  — 
To  love  and  to  be  loved. 

— Emerson. 

N'ow  a  section  the  most  important  of  all,  for  without 
Love  I  am  "as  sounding  brass  and  tinkling  symbol." 
So  much  Love  so  much  Power. 

Life  is  universal,  but  in  Man  Life  is  transmuted  into 
human  form  and  is  Love.  The  only  Power  Thought 
can  direct  is  Love.  Thought  is  the  individual  expres- 
sion of  Life;  and  Love,  the  race  or  the  Human  expres- 
sion. Love  is  the  Absolute  in  the  Soul.  Love  is  in 
reality  God,  for  it  is  the  Omnipotent  in  Human  form. 
Therefore  so  much  Love  so  much  am  I  a  man. 
The  subconscious  Power  that  I  direct  by  concentration 
is  that  form  of  Life,  that  Mode  of  Motion,  we  name. 
Love. 


—THE  ROAD  TO  SUCCESS.  119 

Therefore  Success  depends  upon  your  having  a  warm 
heart  and  your  radiating  at  all  times,  Love.  This  radi- 
ation is  called  improperly,  "Personal  magnetism."  It, 
like  magnetism,  is  a  Mode  of  Motion,  and  it  is  like 
magnetism,  one  of  the  forms  of  Universal  Attraction, 
and  in  its  attractive  power,  it  acts  as  magnetism  does. 
But  it  is  Love  under  control  of  the  individual  Ego  as 
Will.  Will  directing  the  Life-force,  which  is  Love, 
is  the  secret  of  Success.  Therefore  only  as  you  love 
and  throw  yourself  into  your  Thought  will  you  succeed. 
Love  as  force  can  be  diffused,  expended  upon  a  variety 
of  things;  under  a  variety  of  wishes,  passions  and  en- 
deavours; failure  in  high  endeavor  is  the  result.  Sex- 
ual passion  is  but  one  way  and  not,  by  far,  the  most  de- 
structive. For  with  it  does  go  some  human  feeling.  But 
concentration  upon  mere  business  success,  upon  mere 
money  getting,  upon  a  life  of  mere  superficial  excite- 
ment ;  a  life  of  mere  pleasure ;  these  in  time  completely 
absorb  the  Human  element;  are  most  vitiating  in  the 
making  a  success  in  Character. 

For  Health  let  your  love  manifest  to  all  about  you.  A 
smile,  a  word  of  cheer,  a  helping  hand,  a  generous 
deed,  are  stepping  stones  to  success  in  business,  in  health 
and  in  happiness,  because  they  are  openings  for  the 
stream  of  love;  are  developing  those  radiations  of  per- 
sonal influence  that  cause  others  to  feel  us,  to  respect 
us,  to  confide  in  us,  and  to  do  as  we  wish  them  to  do. 
Cold  heartless  men  may  succeed  in  their  special  line,  but 
they  succeed  at  the  expense  of  health  and  of  the  love 
of  their  fellows. 

Eemember,  Love  is  Power.  As  such  it  will  either  use 
us  in  its  blind  animal  way,  or  we  will  use  it  intelli- 
gently, as  we  do  other  forms  of  Power.  I  can  give  you 
no  greater  thought,  were  I  to  exhaust  all  language,  than 
this.  The  Sub-conscious  is  God  manifesting  as  Love 
and  this  Power  of  God  is  subject  to  Thought,  the 
Human  expression.  Love  can  be,  is  to  be,  directed  by 
Thought.     "By  my  Thought,  ly  my  Auto-Sugg estion 


120  CONCENTRATION: 

/  direct  the  expression  of  the  Infinite  Power  which  1 
am!'  This  is  to  be  your  Thought  as  you  enter  the 
Silence.  Then  the  Silence  becomes  to  jou  the  Holy  of 
Holies ;  becomes  the  Altar  of  the  Most  High ;  the  inner 
Sanctuary  where  is  the  Ark  of  the  Covenant  which 
God,  the  Absolute,  has  made  in  the  Soul. 

Therefore  to  the  extent  you  are  in  Love  with  Beauty 
will  you  succeed  as  an  artist.  As  much  as  you  are  in 
love  with  Groodness  will  you  be  happy.  As  much  as  you 
are  in  love  with  Truth  will  you  be  wise. 

To  love  what  you  do,  is  to  succeed  in  it.  To  love  your 
life  is  to  make  it  a  success.  To  love  your  home  is  to 
make  it  a  happy  one.  To  love  your  business  is  to  suc- 
ceed. Providing,  in  all  these  cases  you  have  first  builded 
a  noble  Ideal  of  all  these,  and  Love  that  Ideal  (which 
is  your  highest  conception  of  God)  '^''with  all  your  heart 
and  soul."  "Son,  give  me  thy  heart!"  success  says 
to  every  man.  From  concentration  where  heart  and 
intellect  both  join,  comes  the  only  success  worth  striv- 
ing for — Happiness,  Health  and  Supply. 
Love  begets  Faith,  and  Faith  begets  enthusiasm;  en- 
thusiasm begets  effort  and  effort  begets  success.  Love 
is  the  beginning  and  the  end  of  Life,  and  it  continues 
a  companion  all  the  way. 

Therefore  the  Genius  of  Success  says  to  each : — "Lovest 
thou  me?"  and  well  for  him  who  can  truthfully  say, 
"Lord!  thou  knowest  that  I  love  thee!"  Then  shall 
come  the  condition  of  proof, — "Feed  my  sheep." 

A  noble  Ideal  is  the  only  possible  salvation,  for  that 
is  the  mould  into  which  Love  flows  and  materializes, 
and  the  Ideal  determines  our  success  or  failure.  That 
Ideal  should  be  no  less  than  perfect.  "I  the  imperfect 
adore  my  own  perfect,"  says  Emerson,  and  Kant  says, 
"The  execution  of  his  whole  duty  and  the  final  reaching 
of  the  goal  placed  before  him  as  a  work,  the  command 
is  here — ^Be  ye  perfect  ?'  The  test  of  perfection  is,  that 
'You  love  your  neighbor  as  yourself." 


—THE  ROAD  TO  SUCCESS.  121 

Any  thought  taken  into  the  Silence  that  is  not  born  of 
Love  is  weakness  and  writes  that  weakness  in  all  your 
expression.  Therefore  when  yon  love,  yon  fulfill  all 
Law.  This  is  the  Law  and  the  Prophets: — "Do  nnto 
others  as  you  would  that  they  shall  do  unto  you!" 
You  wish  all  to  act  to  you  in  Love  of  the  Beautiful  and 
the  Grood.  By  taking  thoughts  born  of  these  loves  into 
the  Silence,  by  concentrating  upon  them  you  prove 
your  love  for  yourself,  and  in  that  love  you  will  love 
others.  Richard  Eealf,  the  poet,  wished  written  on 
his  tomb : — 

"He  loved  his  friends,  their  love  was  sweet!" 
And  Leigh  Hunt  has  for  his  epitaph: — 

"Write  me  as  one  who  loved  his  fellowmen!" 

Such  lives  are  successes,  no  matter  if  the  grave  covers 
much  that  we  call  error  and  failure.  Soul  Unfoldment 
is  at  last  the  standard.  Success  is  attained  in  perfec- 
tion only  when  we  come  into  the  Realization  that  we 
are  one  with  Infinity.  One  example  remains  for  us. 
"I  and  my  Father  are  one!"  This  is  Loves  complete- 
ness. This  is,  as  far  as  earth  is  concerned — Perfect 
Success. 

When  Man  shall  thus  concentrate  in  Love,  then  shall 
be  fulfilled  the  prophecy  of  Henry  Bernard  Carpenter: 

Man  shall  not  ask  his  brother  any  more 
"Believest  thou?"  but  "Lovest  thou?"  till  all 
Shall  answer  at  God's  altar,  "Lord  I  love !" 
For  Hope  may  anchor,  Faith  may  steer,  but  Love, 
Great  Love  alone,  is  Captain  of  the  Soul. 


122  CONCENTRATION: 


SECTION  XXIV. 


OPINIONS  AND  METHODS  OF  OTHERS. 

In  order  to  discover  truth  we  must  be  truthful  ourselves 
and  must  welcome  those  who  point  out  our  errors  as  heart- 
ily as  those  who  approve  our  discoveries. 

— Max  Muller. 

Seeking  happiness  as  our  aim,  we  declare  knowledge  and 
obedience  to  that  knowledge  to  be  its  means,  and  freedom 
its  condition.  The  cultivation  must  receive  attention  not 
less  than  the  improvement  and  equipment  of  the  brain, 
if  our  lives  are  to  be  worthy,  useful  and  happy. 

— George  IlUs. 

That  you  may  have  the  same  thought  from  other  points  of 
view  I  give  the  following  extracts.  This  is  from  the  editor 
of   The  New  Thought  Journal,  London: 

CONCENTRATION 

Reserve  a  special  hour  each  day  for  cultivation  of  your 
ideal.  Begin  by  reading  for  half  an  hour  or  so  along  the 
lines  you  wish  to  develop.  Always  use  for  this  purpose 
the  best  and  most  inspiring  authority  you  can  find  upon 
the  subject,  that  you  may  come  into  rapport  with  those 
who  have  accomplished  most  in  the  field  you  wish  to 
enter.  Read  that  you  may  be  enthused  by  their  enthusiasm 
and  enlightened  by  their  accomplishment.  Read  slowly 
and  meditate  upon  each  sentence.  To  meditate  is  to  be 
still  mentally  and  let  the  spirit  of  the  writer  commune  with 
your  spirit,  imparting  to  you  the  great  things  which  can 
never  be  expressed  in  words  alone. 

Choose  the  highest  reading  on  your  special  line,  then  "loaf 
and  invite  your  soul,"  to  absorb  what  is  beyond  your  pres- 
ent understanding. 

After  reading  and  meditating  thus  until  you  are  mentally 
and  spiritually  exalted  in  the  desired  realm,  lay  aside 
your  reading  and  lie  down  (if  possible)  in  a  comfortable 
position,  taking  pains  to  give  the  lungs  freedom  for  full 
breathing.  Of  course  you  have  your  windows  well  open. 
Never   go  into  the  silence,  or  go  to   sleep  in  a  tightly- 


—THE  ROAD  TO  SUCCESS.  123 

closed  room.  The  best  position  for  receptive  silence  is 
to  lie  flat  on  the  back  without  a  pillow.  Now  breathe 
slowly  and  deeply  through  nostrils,  filling  the  lungs  com- 
fortably full,  beginning  at  the  bottom;  hold  the  breath  as 
long  as  you  can  comfortably;  then  take  pains  to  exhale 
very  slowly  and  evenly.  Breathe  thus  for  six  or  eight  min- 
utes or  more,  while  the  Divine  Breath  flows  through  you, 
cleansing  and  rejuvenating  every  cell  of  brain  and  body. 
Then  begin  to  picture  yourself  as  developing  on  this  de- 
sired special  line.  Think  of  all  life  as  a  school  in  which 
you  are  getting  ready  for  your  career.  Think  of  every- 
thing that  comes  to  you  as  a  special  lesson  which 
is  to  be  cheerfully  learned  in  order  to  help  in 
your  development.  Imagine  yourself  as  making  rapid 
progress.  Dwell  upon  the  idea  that  you  are  full  of 
quiet,  steady  enthusiasm,  growing  enthusiasm,  for 
your  work  on  this  line.  Never  mind  how  enthusiastic  you 
may  feel  about  it;  just  keep  on  imagining  and  aflarming 
the  growing  enthusiasm  and  wisdom  and  power  ypu  wish 
to  feel.  Then  relax  and  let  the  spirit  work  in  and  through 
you  for  the  accomplishment  of  your  special  desire. 
Allow  no  mental  arguments  against  your  desires.  Dismiss 
adverse  suggestions  and  give  yourself  up  to  the  idea  that 
all  you  desire  is  manifesting.  Take  it  all  for  granted.  Get 
into  the  silence  of  it  as  if  it  were  a  game  you  are  playing 
Silence  reason  and  PLAY.  "Play  pretend,"  just  as  you 
did  when  a  child.  Laugh  at  your  fears  and  play  with  a 
will. 

Keep  this  up  daily,  allowing  nothing  to  interfere.  It  is  of 
the  utmost  importance  if  you  really  mean  to  develop  on 
that  special  line.  Time  will  prove  the  value  of  this  prac- 
tice; you  will  find  yourself  growing  in  that  deep,  quiet 
enthusiasm  which  really  accomplishes  things. 


A   THOUGHT    PROM    TENNYSON. 

Poets  write  in  the  condition  of  pefect  concentration  and 
fortunately  Tennyson,  in  a  letter,  tells  us  how  he  in- 
duces it: 

"A  kind  of  waking  trance,"  he  says,  "I  have  frequently 
had,  quite  up  from  boyhood,  when  I  have  been  all  alone. 
This  has  generally  come  upon  me  through  repeating  my 
own  name  two  or  three  times  to  myself  silently,  till  all 
at  once  as  it  were,  out  of  the  intensity  of  consciousness 
of  individuality,  the  individuality  itself  seemed  to  dissolve 
and  fade  away  into  boundless  Being,  and  this  not  a  con- 
fused state,  but  the  clearest  of  the  clearest,  the  surest  of 
the  surest,  the  wisest  of  the  wisest,  utterly  beyond  words, 


124  CONCENTRATION: 

where  death  were  almost  laughable  impossibility,  the  loss 
of  personality  (if  so  it  were)  seeming  but  the  only  true 
life.  I  am  ashamed  of  my  feeble  description.  Have  I  not 
said  the  state  is  utterly  beyond  words?  But  in  a  moment, 
when  I  come  back  to  my  normal  state  of  'sanity,'  I  am 
ready  to  fight  for  mein  liebes  Ich  and  hold  that  it  will  last 
for  eons." 

— "Memoir"   l)y  Hallam   Tennyson. 

He  also  gives  this  same  method  of  concentration,  until  all 

consciousness  of  personality  is  lost  in  Principle,  through 

Concentrating   upon   his    own   name,   in   his   poem,   "The 

Ancient  Sage,"  putting  these  words  into  the  discourse  of 

the  sage: 

For  more  than  once  when  I 

Sat  all  alone,  revolving  by  myself 

The  word  that  is  the  symbol  of  myself, 

The  mortal  limit  of  the  Self  was  loosed. 

And  past  into  the  Nameless,  as  a  cloud 

Melts  into  heaven.    I  touched  my  limbs,  the  limbs 

Were  strange,  not  mine — and  yet  no  shade  of  doubt, 

But  utter  clearness,  and  thro'  loss  of  self 

The  gain  of  such  large  life  as  matched  with  ours 

Were  sun  to  spark — unshadowable  in  words, 

Themselves  but  shadows  of  a  shadow-world. 

EXTRACT  FROM  "MIND." 

There  is  much  of  helpful  suggestion  in  the  following  beau- 
tiful extract  from  an  article  by  Winifred  Hathaway  in 
Mind. 

You  must  concentrate.  You  must  first  systematically  and 
carefully  select  and  determine  upon  the  subject  of  your 
desires.  You  must  be  exact  in  every  detail;  do  not  blame 
results  if  you  have  concentrated  upon  a  confused  idea. 
You  must  then  give  it  your  undivided  attention.  It  has 
been  stated  that  meditation  is  a  lost  art.  For  the  masses 
it  is,  but  for  the  individual,  by  constant  attention,  it  will 
become  habit.  At  first  the  effort  will  be  a  conscious  one, 
objective,  but  by  ceaseless  thought  it  will  gradually  become 
subjective;  even  in  sleep  the  mind  will  carry  on  a  train 
of  thought.  To  one  accustomed  to  concentration  the  object 
of  desire  comes  almost  immediately;  but  to  the  no\'ice 
the  time  is  long;  only  patience,  exhaustless,  infinite,  can 
bring  about  the  desired  result.  By  actual  experience  it  has 
been  proved  that  a  full  year  is  necessary  to  acquire  this 
art;  but  is  it  not  worth  the  effort?  Once  possessed  nothing 
is  impossible;  realized  hopes  and  dreams;  matured  plans; 


—THE  ROAD  TO  SUCCESS.  125 

are  the  result.  And  above  all,  the  knowledge  that  you  are 
the  master  of  your  fate.  But  remember,  that  you  are 
responsible  for  the  use  of  your  accomplished  desires.  If 
you  wish  for  money  you  will  be  held  accountable  to  the 
last  cent;  or  for  fame,  'tis  yours  to  keep  untarnished;  if 
for  mental  attainments,  desire  also  the  wisdom  to  use 
knowledge,  for  if  one  minutest  particle  fail  to  fulfill  its 
mission  yours  is  the  blame. 

ARTIFICIAL   AIDS. 

The  use  of  artificial  means  is  well  explained  in  this  extract 
from  Hudson  Tuttle. 

The  usefulness  of  all  such  objects,  as  a  bright  coin,  a  set 
in  a  ring,  or  glass  of  water,  is  in  fixing  and  concentrating 
the  mind.  A  glass  of  water  or  a  brilliant  set,  have  just 
as  much  potency  for  this  purpose  as  "magic  mirrors," 
"crystals,"  etc.,  all  duly  "magnetized."  It  must  be  under- 
stood that  the  "influence"  does  not  come  from  these  objects, 
but  the  state  which  the  mind  attains  by  its  attention.  The 
object  gazed  at  is  secondary  and  inconsequential. 
Highly  recommended  as  this  method  has  been  it  is  by  no 
means  to  be  cultivated.  It  is  the  process  by  which  the 
Hindu  gains  his  "wisdom,"  and  becomes  the  type  of  passive 
imbecility  and  hopeless  laziness.  The  way  to  receive  the 
highest  spiritual  gifts  is  to  strive  for  spiritual  strength. 
The  way  to  become  impressible  to  great  thoughts,  is  to 
bring  the  mind  up  for  their  reception. 


Aliens!  through  struggles  and  wars! 

The  goal  that  was  named  cannot  be  countermanded. 

Have  the  past  struggles  succeeded? 

What  has  succeeded?    yourself?    your  nation?    Nature? 

Now  understand  me  well — it  is  proved  in  the  essence  of 

things  that  from  the  fruition  of  success,  no  matter  what, 

shall   come  forth   something  to   make   a  greater   struggle 

necessary. 

—Walt  Whitman. 


126  CONCENTRATION: 


THE  PARTING  WOED. 

Theory,  advice,  instruction,  are  comparatively  worthless 
without  he  who  seeks  shall  use  that  which  he  finds. 
This  book  has  that  value  for  you  which  you  shall  de- 
termine. 

To  read  and  then  lay  it  aside,  no  matter  how  much  you 
enjoy  it;  no  matter  how  much  you  find  in  it  to  admire; 
w^ill  benefit  you  little.  To  be  of  benefit  you  must 
adopt  the  Truth  you  find  here,  as  the  method  of  living. 
You  must  practice  it.  Demonstration  alone  is  Posses- 
sion. 

Select  your  season  and  make  sacred  promise  to  your- 
self that  you  will  keep  it  as  carefully  with  yourself  as 
if  you  made  it  to  your  dearest  friend.  When  that 
season  comes,  be  it  five  minutes,  or  be  it  an  hour,  retire 
to  your  ordinary  place  of  relaxing  and  in  your  ordinary 
way  of  keeping  this  tryst,  keep  it — Uelax — Concentrate 
— thinh. 

Keep  this  up.  It  will  soon  become  your  custom  so  to 
retire  into  the  "closet  of  meditation''  whenever  any 
question  arises.  There  you  will  listen  to  the  "still 
small  voice"  which  the  prophet  heard,  and  as  he  was 
led,  you  will  be:  "He  leadeth  me!''  will  become  your 
constant  Affirmation. 

I  have  done  all  I  may.  I  have  told  you  how  I,  how 
many  others,  have  found  the  way.  I  have  pointed  out 
the  road.  Now  I  leave  you  with  the  only  direction  pos- 
sible for  travelling  it.  Practice!  Through  practice 
you  will  enter  the  Silence  where  by  Telepathy  we  shall 

often  meet.  ^j        r  •     j 

Your  friend, 

HENRY  HARRISON  BROWN. 


'Now"  Folk  Mountain  Home, 
Glen  wood,  .CaJ,, 

December  25,  1906. 


P     RETURN     CIRCULATION  DEPARTMENT    Ig/QS 
^     TO— #^      202  Main  Library                       J-O  f  au 

LOAN  PERIOD  1 
-     HOME  USE 

2 

3 

4 

5                                ( 

5 

ALL  BOOKS  MAY  BE  RECALLED  AFTER  7  DAYS 

Renewals  and  Recharges  may  be  made  4  days  prior  to  the  due  date. 

Books  may  be  Renewed  by  calling     642-3405. 

DUE  AS  STAMPED  BELOW 

mmmzo' 

91 

UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA,  BERKELEY 
FORM  NO.  DD6                                 BERKELEY,  CA  94720 

®s 

F 


U.C.  BERKELEY  LIBRARIES 


CD3fll57S13 


